SUPER MARIO BROS
by Knight Writer 95
Summary: Mario and Luigi are the Italian-American owners of a struggling plumbing business. When they fall into another dimension, they find themselves embroiled in a conspiracy involving a princess, a stone, a dictator, a plan to take over their world, and fungus. Can they save the world from going down the drain? One thing's for sure: this ain't no game. Re-write of the 1993 movie.
1. Prologue

**SUPER MARIO BROS.**

 _Brooklyn, 1995_

Lightning forked through the sky and rain pelted the asphalt hard as a woman clutching a bundle tightly to her chest ran through the streets. At a corner she looked furtively over her shoulder, her bright green eyes scanning the space but seeing nothing except cars which lumbered through the precipitation, headlights blinding anyone who looked at them. Not seeing what she was looking for, the woman cinched her cloak tighter around her frame, adjusted the bundle in her arms, and resumed running. Finally she stopped in front of a church run orphanage where she placed the bundle she was carrying on the top step. She removed something from around her neck, placed it on top of the bundle and knocked rapidly on the door before turning and disappearing into Brooklyn's rain soaked streets.

Cars honked their horns and the drivers shouted obscenities at the woman as she ran into the street to an open manhole cover which she climbed down into the city's sewers. In the dark and dank sewer system she continued running deeper into the labyrinth of tunnels, still looking over her shoulder every few seconds. Finally she stopped at an intersection of the sewer pipes to catch her breath. She didn't see the tall figure in military garb emerge from the shadows behind until it was too late. The person lashed out and grabbed her arm in a grip as strong as iron. The woman whirled around and gasped when she saw her assailant.

"Koopa!"

"Where's the stone?" asked Koopa, his eyes glinting dangerously in the low light.

"It's safe from you!" the woman spat and slapped Koopa in the face as hard as she could.

Surprised, the military man released his grip on the woman who stumbled a few steps before regaining her footing and running again. But Koopa was faster than she was and threw her against a wall when he reached her.

"My patience wains, my queen. Tell me where the rock is."

The queen got back on her feet and saw that they were in a very old part of the sewer. The timbers supporting the tunnel looked rotted and ready to cave in. Maybe if she was lucky Koopa would be caught in it. The queen put her hastily conceived plan into action faster than one would have thought possible and threw all her weight against the support beams which broke with one blow, initiating a collapse right above her. Koopa let out an angered hiss as he watched the cave-in bury the queen, taking the information he needed with it.

 _"_ _General Koopa,"_ came a voice over his radio.

"What is it?" he snapped.

 _"_ _General, the portal is starting to destabilize. It is advisable that you return immediately."_

Koopa looked one last time at the rocks that had taken his prize before replying. "I'm on my way."

The fact that he had failed to obtain the needed information was but a minor setback in his grand plans. He could afford to wait for now. Eventually Koopa would find the stone and with it he would attain his destiny. It was inevitable.

* * *

At the orphanage where the queen had left her bundle one of the sisters who worked there opened the door and looked out into the cold dreary night. Seeing nothing up or down the street the sister looked down and saw what had been left on the doorstep. It was a baby, barely a year old. She picked up the baby and carried it into its new home. Inside the other sisters came to fawn over their new charge. When brought to the Mother Superior, she took the strange rock that had been left with the baby and held it up to the light. It was a curious object and looking at it the Mother Superior got the feeling that this child had a grand destiny ahead of it.

She had no idea how right she was.

* * *

 _A/N: This fanfiction is a (hopefully better) re-imagining of the 1993_ Super Mario Bros. _movie starring Bob Hoskins, John Leguizamo, and Dennis Hopper. I personally think that the basic premise (as silly as it was) had a lot of potential that was ruined by poor writing and bad directing. This is my attempt to rectify that. This chapter is just a teaser for what's to come in the new year. I hope you like this version of the introduction. Please leave a review telling me why you liked of disliked this and why. I'm going to need a lot of input from you to make this as good as it can be._

 _Knight Writer 95 out_


	2. Meet the Mario Brothers

Chapter 1

 _Brooklyn, 21 years later..._

"Mario Brothers Plumbing, no leak too small. Yes sir... no sir, we can take care of it... we can be over soon... yes sir, don't let anyone touch it, leave it to the professionals. Thank you sir!"

As soon as the phone was put away a grin stretching from ear to ear appeared on Mario's face. They finally had a job!

"Luigi! We've got work!" he called out as he walked into the living room of the small rundown apartment where his younger brother lay on the sofa watching some show on close encounters or some other such nonsense. "C'mon, get off your butt and get your tools, Luigi. There's a broken dishwasher at Mama Leone's."

"Hang on, Mario, this guy on Miraculous World says he just spent a week in another dimension," Luigi protested, his eyes never leaving the TV screen.

"The only thing miraculous I know is that we've still got a roof over our heads and food to eat," Mario shot back as he picked up the TV remote and hit the power button. "And what's this? Don't tell me that you're actually spending money on this!"

Mario had found issues of the New York Post and a few other magazines that reported on aliens and the supernatural. The headline on the Post was about another girl from Brooklyn who had gone missing.

 _Pauline Santini Missing_

 _Seventh Brooklyn Girl to Disappear in One Week_

"Don't throw that out, that's the issue with the article about the missing Brooklyn girls and the scientist whose brain got turned into cheese."

"Why do you read this stuff? It's garbage. And that stuff is never gonna happen, how could it?" Mario laughed.

"Hey, it could happen, anything's possible, Mario. You just gotta believe," Luigi stated as he grabbed his tool belt and followed Mario out the door.

Mario and Luigi were Italian-American plumbers and owners of the struggling Mario Brothers Plumbing Service. Mario was of average height, stocky, proudly wore a mustache, and was athletic, having played on his high school football team. He was level headed, a rather no-nonsense kind of guy, and the eldest of the two brothers at thirty. Luigi was twenty-three, taller than his older brother, clean shaven, and built like a track runner which he was a part of in high school. He was the dreamer, the one always ready to believe in what others would call impossible.

"I believe, Luigi," said Mario as they pulled out into traffic in their battered old step van. "It's that what you believe and what I believe are entirely different things. You believe in UFOs, Atlantis, and the Loch Ness Monster. I, on the other hand, believe that our rent is four weeks overdue and that our plumbing business has a major leak. Hey! What are you doing? The turn is up ahead!"

Luigi, who was driving, had turned into an alley instead of the street he should have.

"Trust me, Mario," he grinned. "I got a feeling about this alley, this will get us there faster."

"You're crazy, Luigi. Every time that you get a feeling about something we end up bruised, broken, or in some kind of fracas."

"Hey, there are hundreds of animals like birds and turtles that navigate on instinct and my instincts tell me that this is faster."

"Again with the birds and turtles? You talk about them so much I'm beginning to hallucinate birds see turtles in my sleep! With your head in the clouds all the time it's a wonder you ever learned a serious craft like plumbing."

"Well you and pop forced me."

"Forced you? What are you talking about? You've got free will, haven't you? _I'm_ the one who was forced into the family business. Pop made me promise I'd continue our family's plumbing excellence."

"Look, we're here!" Luigi exclaimed as he braked. "What did I tell you? We shaved some time off our arrival."

"Yeah, and it's an absolute miracle that we made it alive, especially with you driving."

"I thought you didn't believe in miracles."

The brothers got out of the truck only for Mario to moan when he saw the van that was parked in front of Mama Leone's.

"Oh great! Santini beat us to it again! How does he do that? C'mon, Luigi, let's see if we can't salvage this."

Mario grabbed his tool belt from Luigi and walked into Mama Leone's, a determined glint in his eye.

Two people in white coveralls Mario recognized were standing in the back of the restaurant talking with the manager, Johnny.

"It's Doug and Mike. This just keeps getting better and better."

"It's a two day job, and that's if we get the parts we need on time. You know how it is with ordering parts, right?"

Mario hustled over and cut in before either the rival plumbers or Johnny could say another word.

"You said it was a broken dishwasher when you called us for the job," he chewed out while glaring at the white suited plumbers.

"It is, it leaks from the bottom," said Johnny, still visibly anxious over the situation.

"That could be either a washer or a hose. It's a two hour job, max. These two hacks are trying to snow you."

Doug and Mike looked at Mario and Luigi and then at Johnny.

"Could you excuse us for just a minute?" asked Mike as he grabbed Mario by the tool belt and dragged them out of earshot of the manager.

"Hey, nobody touches my tools," growled Mario as he slapped Mike's hand off his belt.

"Sorry, I understand. And I assume you, Mario, know that no one messes with our boss," both plumbers leaned in and pointed at their coveralls, "Santini. Know him?"

"We grew up in the same neighborhood. He was the oldest kid on the street and a bully. And he's not a plumber, he's a second rate hack like you."

The four plumbers held a staring competition for a few seconds before Doug called over to the manager.

"What's it going to be? The Mario Brothers or Santini?"

Over where he stood Johnny swallowed nervously. Names were important here.

"Two days you said? That sounds fine."

Doug and Mike smiled and walked back out to their truck.

"Unbelievable. They're not a company, they're a mob," Mario muttered.

"I'm sorry, Mario" Johnny said as he approached the brothers. "I know your old man was friends with Mama Leone before he passed away. How about I make it up to you with a complimentary meal?"

"Yeah, that sounds great!" smiled Luigi, who had a particular weakness for Mama Leone's meatballs. "What do you say, Mario?"

"We'll take it in a box."

* * *

"Santini, I'd love to get my hands on him and wrap a pipe wrench around his neck. His people are always beating us to jobs, I can't figure it out!" growled Mario, now behind the wheel. "And what's wrong with this van? I thought I told you to fix the radiator!"

Their truck had indeed started making noises and sounded like it was ready to die any minute. Mario quickly pulled over so they could check the engine.

"Ease up, Mario, it's been making that sound all week," Luigi said.

"C'mon, Luigi, you didn't tell me that!" Mario groused as he and his brother got out to lift the hood. "Be careful, it's hot."

Mario's word was true as when the engine hood was opened the brothers were blasted in the face with steam.

"I'll see what I can do with this. Here's my phone, check for work," said the elder brother and handed Luigi his cell phone before starting to look at the engine.

* * *

Larry and Roy had not been having a good week. Two weeks ago the portal that had connected their world to the one they were currently in had become active again for the first time in twenty-one years. Their boss, Koopa, had immediately sent them through to bring back the long lost princess. The only problem was that thus far the two had failed to bring back the right woman. They were back in the other dimension again for one last attempt.

Larry was walking back to the car he and his cousin had procured after stopping at one of New York's many hot dog carts.

"Here," he said handing Roy his hot dog after getting in the car.

"What is it?" Roy asked, sniffing the food cautiously.

"They say its dog," Larry replied and threw his bun out the window.

"We'd better not blow this again, Roy. Koopa will de-evolve us if we screw up again."

"Right, so don't blow it this time."

"There she is!" Roy exclaimed so suddenly that Larry nearly choked on his hot dog.

"You sure?"

"Yeah, two arms, one head, two legs. Let's go get her."

"Nah-ah, you've been wrong the last several times. If you think it's her then you go get her. I'll wait here. I'm not getting de-evolved."

Roy made a face at Larry and got out of the car to trail their target until she reached a suitable place to be abducted. It wouldn't do to get entangled with this world's law officers. She was just reaching an opportune place for Roy to grab her when two workers carrying a thick pane of glass walked out in front of him. The would-be kidnapper didn't see the glass but felt it when he smacked against it hard. By the time he looked up again the target had disappeared.

"Where's the girl?" asked Larry when Roy returned to the car empty handed.

"I lost her."

"That's just great," Larry complained and poked Roy in the eyes.

So far their week did not show any signs of getting better.

* * *

Luigi had checked the messages on Mario's phone. There was no work for them.

"Where you going?" he asked Mario who had finally looked up from the engine and was walking towards the store they were parked in front of.

"To get some water," the elder brother answered. "Any work?"

"Nah, we got nothing."

Mario grunted and walked into the mini mart. Luigi hung back, intending to turn on the truck's radio and listen to music but collided with someone and was thrown to the ground when he turned around.

"I'm so sorry," Luigi started saying as he hurriedly got to his feet and extended a hand to help the other person up. "I should have been more mindful of my surroundings."

"No, it's my fault, I was looking at my phone instead of where I was going," the person insisted while accepting the offered hand from Luigi.

When Luigi got his first look at the person's face, he had to catch his breath. She was beautiful! Her eyes were as blue as sapphires, her face heart shaped, and her hair was a shade of amber so bright and intense it almost seemed unreal.

"Hi," was all Luigi could manage to say in that moment, having lost his ability to form complete sentences.

"Hello," she smiled at him. "Look, I'm sorry for running into you, it's just that I have somewhere I need to be and I'm running late. I was checking my texts and that's why I didn't see you."

It took a second more for Luigi's brain to engage after she spoke and he stammered out a reply. "No, it's alright. But it sounds like you could use a ride. I've got a van. It's broken right now but I'm hoping it will be a quick fix."

"That's nice of you. Yeah, a ride would be great if you can get your van fixed. Thanks."

At that moment Mario walked out of the store, carrying a large bottle of water and muttering under his breath.

"Hey, Mario!" Luigi called. "We've got a lady here who needs a ride. I said we might be able to give her one if we can fix the truck quick."

"I don't know, Luigi. Where do you need to go, miss?"

"Not too far, just the other end of the Brooklyn Bridge."

"Hey, the bridge isn't too far from here. We can have her there in no time, what do you say, Mario?"

"Well... alright," he acquiesced. "I guess the bridge isn't too far out of the way. If this will really help you out, miss, please step into the van. Fortunately all we need to get it running again is some water for the radiator."

"Thank you," the girl said and flashed a thousand watt smile. "This means a lot to me, you have no idea how important it is."

After pouring in the water, the engine was able to start and the trio were on their way to the Brooklyn Bridge.

"I can't thank you enough for this ride," the woman was saying. "I'm Daisy, by the way."

"Luigi, and this is my brother, Mario. What do you need to get to the Brooklyn Bridge for?"

"Have you heard about the dinosaur excavation going on by the bridge?"

"Of course!" Luigi exclaimed. "I love that kind of stuff! What's so urgent at the dig that you have to be there today?"

"The discovery of the fossils has disrupted the installation of a new pipe for the city waterworks and the head contractor is coming down today to try and smooth things over and get the project back under way. I have to be there because I'm the boss."

"Really? You're in charge of the dig? That's impressive, you must really know your stuff," Luigi grinned. He was falling for this girl more every minute.

"I better know it, I've wanted to be a paleontologist for as long as I can remember. The site has been great, we've found some new species and iridium in the rocks. We think it could be the impact site of the meteorite that wiped out the dinosaurs sixty-five million years ago."

"There used to be dinosaurs in Brooklyn?" Luigi asked excitedly.

"There used to be Dodgers here too," Mario spoke up. "Who's the contractor you're holding up?"

"Santini Construction."

"Santini? Now I'm really glad we gave you a ride, I hope you really stick it to that creep."

"Why? Do you have a beef with Santini?"

"Something like that. You see, we're plumbers and that mobster is running us out of business. We just lost a job to his goons."

"He's not making it easy for us to dig up the bones either. He has his men harass us every day, it's slowing us down."

"The guy really is a mobster," Mario muttered.

"That's an interesting crystal you have there," said Luigi, indicating the crystal pendant that Daisy was wearing around her neck. "Did you find that at the excavation site too?"

"No, actually. It was with me when I was found."

"What do you mean by that?"

"I was abandoned. I was raised by the Sisters of St. Teresa. This rock is all I have of my parents."

Silence permeated the van as they drove the rest of the way.

"As much as I'd like to continue a conversation with you, we have reached our destination," said Mario as he parked the van outside the excavation which was surrounded by picketing construction workers.

"Hey, I just want to say thanks again for the ride. I really can't miss meeting Santini. If this works out maybe we can finish the dig without any further interruptions."

"It was no problem, Daisy, now go knock Santini down a few pegs," Luigi grinned and watched her walk off to meet the construction mogul. "She really is pretty, isn't she?"

"Yeah, she is. You should ask her out," Mario smiled.

"No, no I can't," Luigi started protesting.

"Come on, what's wrong with you?" Mario encouraged. "Ask her out or you might regret it later."

* * *

While Mario was attempting to convince his brother to ask Daisy out, Daisy herself was approaching a tall man with slicked back hair and wearing an expensive suit with a hard glint in her eyes.

"Are you the boss around here?" he asked as she approached.

"I am."

"I'm Luca Santini, the boss elsewhere. How much longer are you going to be holding up my construction crew with this dig of yours? That waterworks pipe has to be installed soon and you and your fellow students are not helping us stay on schedule by going through the tunnel centimeter by centimeter with camel hair brushes."

"We'll be here for as long as our court order lasts, Mr. Santini. The college has explained to you how important this dig is. We'd be done a lot sooner if your goons would leave us alone and let us work."

"Look at those men," Santini pointed to the picketers on the other side of the chain-link fence. "They're honest hard working men with families to feed. If they're not working they're not getting paid and if they're not getting paid, their families don't eat."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Santini, but this is an incredibly important find. We're working as fast as we can and without any further disruptions your men will be back to work in a few days."

"You look like you're a smart girl. I'll bet that you'll be finished here by tonight. There've been a lot of girls going missing in Brooklyn lately. It'd be a shame if you were added to the list."

"Mr. Santini, I will not be intimidated into abandoning this site until all the fossils have been excavated. If you'd be kind enough to call off your goons your pipe will be installed that much sooner."

The two glared at each other for a few moments until Santini sniffed, looked down, and turned to depart.

"Alright, you've made your position clear. Let me be equally transparent. Be done with your dinosaur dig by tonight or you'll regret it."

Santini got into his limo and drove off from the site, Daisy's eyes never once leaving the vehicle until it had disappeared from view.

"That was really something, Daisy," Mario applauded as he and Luigi walked up behind her. "You ought to be given a medal. That's the first time I've seen someone stand up to that scumbag."

"Thanks, I just hope nothing happens to the dig."

"Come on, Daisy, what's the worst that could happen? You spend a few more days digging up the dinosaur fossils and then Santini's men can get back to work," Luigi said.

"You don't understand, Santini didn't get where he is in the business world by being nice. If something does happen and it goes to court, we probably won't be able to make anything stick."

The three of them fell silent for a few moments until Mario nudged Luigi to get him to ask Daisy out.

"Y-you know, I bet I know what will put a smile on your face," the younger brother stuttered.

"What would that be?" Daisy asked, taking an interest.

"Well, what if you go out with us for dinner tonight?" Luigi proposed nervously. "Mario's got a date tonight with a girl called Daniella, and if you're willing, perhaps we could make it a double date. Also, since there aren't a lot of other girls at this dig that I can see, perhaps the two of you would like to talk. Of course, it's no big deal if you don't want to go out, it's understandable. After all your dig is being threatened and..."

"Luigi," smiled Daisy, "you're rambling."

"Am I? I'm sorry, I do that sometimes when I get nervous and it certainly doesn't help that you're very pretty and... did I just say that? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to come on so suddenly like that, it's just... I'm rambling again aren't I?"

Daisy's and Mario's eyes were alight with amusement and Daisy decided to take pity on the tomato faced Italian youth.

"Sure, I'll join you for dinner. What time?"

"Y-you will? Great! Are you going to be here the rest of the day?"

"Yes, I won't be going anywhere else."

"Then how about we pick you up here at five o'clock?"

"Five o'clock works perfectly. I'll see you then?"

"You bet. See you tonight Daisy. Bye."

"Goodbye, Luigi."

As the brothers left Luigi let out a shaky breath. His legs felt like they were going to give out any second now. Wiping some sweat from his brow, he noticed that it looked like Mario was struggling to hold back some laughter.

"Alright, Mario, you got something you want to say?"

"Hey, considering the nervous wreck you became, I think you handled yourself rather well, but what would you do without me?"

"I wouldn't mind giving it a try."

"Oh come on, you were going to let her go."

"And now she'll think I'm a complete idiot," Luigi moaned.

"No she won't, you'll impress her. Now let's get back to the apartment and pick you out something for your date tonight."

* * *

 _A/N: Another chapter for you all on the last day of 2015. I hope you liked this chapter and that you all have a great new year. As always, please leave a review. More improvements and changes will be made as this fic progresses. All that and more is waiting in 2016. Until then, keep on writing._

 _Knight Writer 95 out_


	3. New York But Not New York

Chapter 2

Larry and Roy had just found Daisy again. They had been ready to quit for the day when they had a stroke of incredible good luck.

"You know, this world isn't so bad. Especially for a place that's being run by mammals," said Roy as he looked through a newspaper. "They've got perfectly edible people just lying in the gutters and plenty of resources we don't. And for mammals, they're surprisingly violent. Have you read their newspapers?"

"But Koopa won't be able to merge the worlds without that rock and the girl. We can't go back without her, remember what he said," reminded Larry

"That if we don't do the job right this time don't bother coming back at all. That's why we're going to do it right."

"But we haven't! We keep losing her! At this rate we're never going to be able to go back!"

"Well it could be worse. At least if we're stuck here it's a decent place," Roy pointed out and went back to his paper.

Larry turned to his partner to say something but stopped shot when he saw the picture on the front page of Roy's newspaper with a headline about the dig. "Hey! That's her!"

"What? Where?" asked Roy as he dropped the paper and started looking around outside the car.

"Her picture is on the front page of your paper! What does it say?"

"Oh, let's see!"

"Hurry up, we need to find her or Koopa will have us killed!"

"No, he won't kill us. He's not that nice. Ah! Here's the article! It says that she is in charge of a dinosaur fossil excavation near the Brooklyn Bridge! And look at the photo! That's where the portal is!"

"I don't believe it! All this time we've been all over Brooklyn looking for her and she's right in front of us the entire time! C'mon, let's go get her before she leaves the site!"

* * *

"Luigi, will you quit changing you shirt? You look fine," Mario said as his brother went back to his room to change his shirt for the fifth time.

"Are you sure?" asked Luigi from his room.

"Yes! Now get out here or I'm leaving without you."

Luigi emerged from the hallway dressed in the nicest jeans, shirt, and hoodie he had. Mario could also tell he had done his hair up a bit.

"There, see? What did I say? I'm sure she'll be properly impressed."

"Hey, isn't that pop's lucky cap you're wearing?"

Mario was wearing an old but well maintained red flat cap. "Yeah, it is. I found it in the closet and I figured I'd wear it. After all, I am a Mario. And so are you and that means that you're going to be fine tonight. No woman can resist the charm of a Mario."

Luigi smiled and rubbed the back of his head nervously. "I hope you're right, Mario. I really like her."

"You're the one who's saying anything's possible and I think it's very possible that you'll get more than one date with Daisy. Now let's not keep her waiting any longer, shall we?"

"We definitely wouldn't want her thinking we're not gentlemen. I'm right behind you."

* * *

It was time for Larry and Roy to make their move. They had been waiting in their car near the excavation most of the day waiting for the opportune moment to abduct Daisy. The last of the students had left only minutes ago and Daisy was left alone. It was perfect.

"Now remember," said Larry, "we're lawyers. So try to act like one and follow my lead."

The duo approached the fence and Larry rattled it to get Daisy's attention.

"Excuse me, are you Daisy Johnson?"

"Who wants to know?"

"I'm Alan Darrow and this Clarence Donovan, we're lawyers with Santini Construction and we'd like to discuss a few things with you."

"So Santni's finally called in legal help has he? Alright, I have a few minutes before a friend picks me up. Come on in," Daisy agreed and unlocked the gate.

* * *

The Mario brothers van pulled to a stop in front of the dig site.

"I don't see her," said Luigi as he got out.

"Maybe she's still in the tunnel," Mario said. "Don't go assuming the worst now, Daisy said she'd go out with you and I don't think she's one to stand people up."

"Hey, there she is!" the younger brother exclaimed and pointed to where Daisy was, talking with two other men. "HEY! DAISY!"

Larry and Roy look up, see the Mario brothers and panic. Daisy was about to respond to Luigi's call when she was suddenly grabbed from behind and forced in the direction of the tunnel.

"Hey! Let go of her!" Luigi yelled as he threw open the gate. "C'mon, Mario!"

"Daisy! DAISY!" Luigi's voice echoed through the tunnel as the brothers run deeper in, the strung up lights casting eerie shadows across the fossils.

"Maybe those guys are the ones who have been kidnapping those missing girls across Brooklyn," said Mario. "We gotta go back and get some help."

"No! It might be too late by then," Luigi protested and ran deeper still into the tunnel.

"Luigi? Luigi! Come on, don't be stupid! We're plumbers, not heroes!" Mario tried to make his brother see sense as he pursued him.

"I don't see them and I don't hear anything. Where are they?"

"I don't know, but I do know that this is dangerous and we should get the police."

"M-maybe there's a hidden passage somewhere or maybe... maybe..." Luigi started to ramble.

Suddenly the rock face rippled and Daisy's face burst through. "Luigi! Help!"

"Daisy!" Luigi reached for her but only managed to grab the crystal which broke off in his hand when Daisy got sucked back into the wall.

"Did you just see that?" asked Mario, blinking in disbelief.

"Yeah," Luigi confirmed. "Hey, Mario, I got a feeling about this."

"What?"

"Trust me..." he said as he took a few steps back.

"Luigi, what are you doing?"

Instead of answering, Luigi runs forward at the spot in the wall where they had seen Daisy disappear and leaped right through. The wall shimmered and swirled before settling back as though nothing had happened.

Mario looked at the wall, unsure of what to do. Finally he plucked up his courage and threw himself at the wall but was a foot off. He hit solid rock and bounced off.

"Ow!" he exclaimed and leaned against the rock face only to get sucked through himself.

* * *

Luigi got to his feet somewhat shakily and shook his head. Bad idea. He clutched it in pain and looked around. He finds himself surrounded by roughhewn walls of rock which are covered in pictographs depicting a meteorite impacting the earth. Some of the pictographs were filled with a fluorescent moss, making them look like graffiti.

Behind Luigi the wall rippled and Mario stumbled out, colliding with Luigi.

"Oh... what happened to us?" he groaned as he clutched his head.

"I was wonder the same thing," admitted Luigi.

Mario got up and looked around the cavern himself. Below them in a tunnel that looked like a meteorite crater was a mass of swirling energy and imbedded in the walls around it were large coil-like collectors which crackled hellishly with energy.

"What the hell?" Mario muttered. "Where the hell are we?"

"Hell?" Luigi answered after a beat.

"OK, where the heck are we?" Mario amended.

Luigi got back on his feet again and called out. "Daisy!"

His voice echoed through the cavern and got no response.

Mario stopped and held up his hand. "I think I hear a train. This way."

The elder brother heads through a tunnel leading away from the meteorite cavern. As they walked down the tunnel, the sounds of the train became louder and the floor began to vibrate subtly. They saw a metal door at the end and head towards it. When they opened it, the brothers found themselves at the end of a subway platform. The door they just came through had a sign written on it in peeling and faded paint which read 'NO ADMITTANCE! MAINTENANCE CREWS ONLY!' The station looked old and has a feeling of neglect. Not only were the walls cracked, they were covered in a fungus that half obscured more graffiti.

A train pulled into the station that was old, battered, and completely covered in graffiti, some of which looked like it was etched in with acid. The passengers were disgorged and Mario and Luigi got pulled along with the crowd, unable to maneuver anywhere else but where the sea of people determined they would. When the crowd broke at last they had left the station and found themselves on a multi leveled walkway in what looked like a twisted version of Times Square. It was covered in the same fungus that was in the subway station, had the same feeling of decay, and was pulsing with light and noise.

Rock 'n' Roll blared loudly, bright neon signs pulsed and fought for space, advertising their wares. 'Tex-Rex,' a restaurant. 'Fleshworks,' a tattoo parlor. 'The Death Joint,' a weapons shop. A sign reading 'Thwomp Stompers... Just Stomp It!' hung outside a sporting goods store. Large animated billboards dominated the space atop the buildings advertising things like stun sticks and 'Elect Koopa the Statesman.' Below the walkways was the streets above which hung a wire mesh. The cars were all beat up and had telescoping rods with spring mounted Tesla balls on the end which sparked across the mesh not too unlike bumper cars. The crowd traversing the walkways milled, swirled and shoved aggressively.

"What is this place?" Luigi asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

"It's like New York, but it ain't New York," said Mario.

Mario and Luigi milled into the crowd, doing their best to stay close together in this strange world.

"Watch where you're going!" growled a mean looking man in a suit who Mario bumped into.

"Excuse me, could you tell me where I am?" Luigi asked an old lady.

"You're in my way, jerk!" she said and shoved past.

"These people are all assholes," said Mario. "We must be in Manhattan!"

Luigi continued to scan the streets, becoming more and more worried for Daisy's safety. "I don't see her anywhere, do you?"

"No, all I see are a bunch of jerks. We should do what I suggested earlier, call the police. But I'm not getting a signal on my phone, we'll need to find a payphone. You got any change on you?"

It didn't take long for Mario and Luigi to find a phone, but it was unlike any payphone they had seen before. It was hulking, monolithic, and well armored. As they approached it red lights lit up and a deep, growling, computerized voice spoke.

"WARNING! YOU HAVE BREACHED THE PERIMETER. PLEASE STAND BACK."

Mario looked at Luigi, shrugged, and took another step closer. Flame thrower turrets extended from the top of the booth and the same voice came back.

"IF YOU'D LIKE TO MAKE A CALL AT THIS TIME, PLEASE ENTER KOOPONS NOW." There was only a few seconds pause before the system reacted. "YOU HAVE EXCEEDED THE TIME LIMIT. PLEASE TRY YOUR CALL AGAIN LATER."

Mario jumped out of the way of a fire ball that they turrets had launched at him. The turrets were ready to launch again when a high pitched whistling penetrated the air and a youth wearing oversized pneumatic boots landed hard on top of the booth, crushing the flame throwers. He was quickly joined by three other mean faced youths all wearing the same kind of boots. Two of them took out bats and started swinging at the phone, setting off an alarm that sounded like an old busy signal. The other two threatened Mario and Luigi with stun sticks.

"You were gonna use the phone, huh? You must be rich, then. Come on, let's have it, all your money!" he demanded and zapped Mario who reeled back like he was poked with a cattle prod.

"Ow! Stop that! Here," he said in pain and pulled out his wallet which was snatched away quickly.

"What am I supposed to do with this?" the youth asked, holding out the money in front of Mario's face. "Blow my nose? We need coins, Rexes, Koopons!"

"That's one hundred dollars," groaned Mario.

"Uh... I've got eighty-two cents," Luigi stuttered as he held out the change.

The gang member swatted the change out of Luigi's hand in disgust. "What is this? A joke?"

Mario and Luigi look at each other, then back to the gang and shrug.

"Fine," he said. "Search them!"

The other thug patted down the brothers, quickly finding the crystal that Luigi has put in his pocket.

"This looks like it could be worth something," he grinned.

"Hey, give that back!" Luigi demanded only to get hit with a stun stick himself.

"Alright, let's finish them," the first thug said and changed the setting of his stunner from 'stun' to 'fry.'

The brothers were saved not a moment too soon by the sound of coins spilling onto the ground behind them. The others had busted open the phone booth and start scooping up the gold coins as a siren wails in the background.

"Frack it! It's the cops!"

The gang all removed two cylinders from their belts and jammed them into a port in the back of their boots which made a hissing sound. They clicked their heels together and a rising series of beeps was heard until with a pneumatic hiss, the Stompers launch them into the air and far away.

Mario grabbed Luigi and they raced towards the sirens. Several police cars collided through traffic and right past the plumbers except for one car which pulled over by them.

"Hey, thanks a lot," Mario said gracefully.

"Yeah, I thought our goose was cooked," Luigi thanked.

"Lemme see some face-fit," one of the officers said as he approached the two.

"What?" asked Mario, his face perplexed.

"I think he means ID," Luigi whispered.

"Sure here," the elder brother said as he handed over his driver's license.

The cop looked at it but it meant nothing to him. "What the hell is this?"

"Yeah, I know, it's expired. I've been meaning to take care of that."

The cop looked at Mario for a second before yelling to his partner in the car. "Have you ever heard of a driver's license?"

"Nope. Log 'em!"

"In the back, both of you!"

"Whoa, what's the charge?" Mario asked as they were hustled into the back of the battered police car.

"Failure to offer a bribe."

* * *

 _A/N: Now we're really starting to make some changes to the story. I hope you all enjoyed this and sorry for the wait time. I've got a full schedule at college this semester. What's in store next for the Mario Brothers? As always, input and reviews are requested and needed. Keep on writing._

 _Knight Writer 95_


	4. In the Clink

Chapter 3

"Look at this place, it's pathetic! It gets worse every day! Meanwhile the humans have a world that is full of resources. Can you imagine? An endless supply of food, water, clean air! It's like a juicy prime piece of meat just begging to be swallowed! And what are we stuck with? A pit hole that infested with germs, fungus, and is falling apart. Ever since the meteorite struck sixty-five million years ago, we've been exiled to this dump while in the other dimension the mammals thrive!" griped Koopa in his suite to his mistress, Lena.

"It won't be this way for much longer, though. Once you have the stone everything will change," Lena purred as she sidled up to Koopa. She was an attractive woman somewhere in her thirties with lustrous dark red hair and reptilian golden brown eyes.

Koopa was a tall imposing figure, currently wearing a dark green reptile skin warlord's robe. He had very pale green skin, a long face, slicked back bright fire orange hair and fierce ruby red eyes. His penthouse suite in Koopa tower was vast, with marble floors, a spacious bed, a sunken pit with a bar, and a large sleek desk with a computer and vid-com console. Behind the desk were towering crystalline windows that offered a sweeping view of the city below.

"Yes, once I have the rock and the princess, we'll be able to decide out own fate!" he declared, the thought bringing a smile to his face.

"Princess?" Lena questioned, jealousy flashing briefly across her face.

"Yes, once I have both I'll be able to merge the dimensions and destroy the mammals!"

"It's everything you've been working for the past twenty-one years! Your patience is finally about to pay off, you brilliant savage!" praised Lena.

A buzzing came from the doorway and Koopa pressed a button on his computer, bringing up a picture of Larry and Roy who were standing outside his door. Another press of a button and the door opened, admitting the two.

"Cousin!" exclaimed Roy as they approached the desk. "We return with the princess!"

"Are you sure? The last seven times you've failed to bring back the right girl!" hissed Koopa, his eyes narrowing.

"Yes, we are sure! We have succeeded this time, cousin!" Larry professed as he handed a sheet of paper to Koopa. "See for yourself!"

Koopa snatched the sheet away and glanced over it before a large grin spread across his face. "Yes, you are right! The brain scan confirms it! She's the princess! You have done well, this time. I shall not forget this."

Larry and Roy looked elated as they congratulated themselves, giddy with excitement and anticipation.

"Soon a whole new world will be mine," Koopa continued, "and you tow shall be at my side, rich and powerful! It's going to be great! Now, where is the rock?"

The excitement melted from Larry's and Roy's faces and they looked at Koopa blankly.

"Rock... sir?" repeated Larry.

"Yes, the rock, the meteorite fragment I need to merge the dimensions. You do have it, don't you?" his voice took on a dangerous edge.

Larry and Roy shrunk back from Koopa a bit before shaking their heads.

"Then where is it?" demanded Koopa as he rose from his chair, anger burning in his eyes.

The two unfortunate goons before him look at each other, trying to figure out what happened to the shard.

"The plumbers took it," they both say simultaneously.

"Plumbers?"

"Yes, plumbers! They saw us abduct the girl and must have followed us!" Roy stated.

"Yes, that is right! We struggled to bring the girl back through the portal! The plumbers have grabbed the rock before we pulled her through! They must be somewhere out there in the city!"

"You were followed?" roared Koopa, pulling himself up to his full height.

"It could not be helped, cousin! It was either grab the girl then or lose her! If she hadn't struggled so much, those plumbers would never have found the portal!" the air claimed.

"But they did find it, they now have the stone and I can't merge the worlds! Get out of my sight! Both of you!"

Larry and Roy stumbled backwards and continued to trip over themselves as they left the suite as quickly as they could.

* * *

Daisy was unceremoniously shoved into a room that looked like it was cross between a dungeon and a dormitory and the door slammed shut harshly. Inside there were already seven other women who were either playing cards or reading magazines. They all looked bored.

"Hi... I'm Daisy," she said weakly.

A dark haired woman got up and approached Daisy, giving off the impression that she was in charge. She was lithe, looked tough, and dressed in black. "Pauline. Is anyone doing anything to get us out of here?"

"Actually, no one even knows we're here."

Everyone groaned and Pauline's face seemed to fall a bit. "Well thanks for that ray of sunshine, Daisy."

"It could be worse. At least you're all still alive."

"Are you kidding? Look at my hair and my nails! The food here is repulsive, all we have to drink is _tap_ water, and no one has any cigarettes."

"I feel for you, really."

"It won't matter anyway, especially once my brother finds us."

"Why, who's your brother?"

"Luca Santini, that's who. Mark my words, when he gets us out of here these creeps will wish they stayed the hell out of Brooklyn."

* * *

The back of the police car was scratched and torn up as though it had been used to transport wild animals. At the moment it contained Mario, Luigi, and a wiry homeless looking individual who Mario ignored as he tried to talk to the cops.

"Listen, we know who's been kidnapping all of those girls in Brooklyn. If you'd listen we can take you right too them!"

"Wait a minute, did you say Brooklyn?"

The two officers looked at each other and one of them reached for the radio.

"We've got a possible 1658 here, some guy who says he's from 'Brooklyn.'"

"I've heard of Brooklyn," said the other person in the back. "But that's a mythological place."

"Not to us it isn't!" said Luigi. "But if this isn't Brooklyn what is it?"

"Well, this whole place, if it can be called a place, is a sub-dimension. The real dimension is all around us but we can't get to it because we're sub-dimensional. Always have been since the meteorite struck and exiled us all here. That's why everything here's so out of whack with fungus and a corrupt system. At least, that's my theory any way."

"You mean that there's your world and our world and somehow we've crossed over?"

"Might be. Like I said, that's my theory."

"Who are you?"

"Name's Toad. I live in the desert and come in to scavenge and this time they busted my ass. I try to avoid the city as much as possible. I'm an herbivore, see, part chameleon."

"I'm Luigi and this is my brother, Mario."

The cop car sped down a ramp that lead into the parking levels underneath a building whose flickering sign identified it as the Metro Division Police HQ. Mario and Luigi both panicked as the car showed no signs of stopping and was hurtling towards a solid wall. At the last second the vehicle is jerked to a stop by arrester hooks that connected to the rear, like fighter planes on an aircraft carrier.

"All right, out," one of the cops ordered.

Everyone got out in a bit of a daze and were quickly hauled into the station and brought before an officious looking desk clerk, Toad first.

"Name?" the clerk whose name tag identified him as Walter asked, clearly bored.

"Toad."

"Put any personal possession on the turntable and they'll be returned to you at the end of your incarceration, assuming you survive. Take him away," Walter said in the same droning monotone voice.

Mario and Luigi were pushed up next, about to go through the same routine when the doors to the station flew open and several officers wrestled in the gang that had tried to rob the brothers at the payphone earlier. They were shoved up to another desk and their confiscated possessions were put in the turntable. On the other side of the desk a broad shouldered busty cop who looked like she would have done well in women's pro wrestling picked out Daisy's crystal pendant on its broken cord and wrapped it around her neck.

"Hey, that's mine!" Luigi exclaimed. "They stole that from me, I want it back!"

"Shut your trap!" one of the officers snapped and prodded him with a stun rod.

"Name," the desk clerk processing the brothers asked, still in the dull voice.

"Mario."

"Last name?"

"Mario."

Walter only glanced at Mario briefly before writing 'Mario Mario' down on the form.

"Name?" he asked Luigi.

"Luigi Mario."

"Please put any personal items on the turntable. They will be returned to you at the end of your incarceration assuming you survive."

The brothers placed their tool belts on the turntable along with their wallets, watches, and a St. Christopher medallion from Luigi. They were then whacked on the back with a night stick by the two officers that arrested them and herded further into the station. As they were put into another line both of them recoil at the sight of tall things with small reptilian heads.

"What are those things?" asked Mario.

Toad, who was in the line ahead of them answered. "They're Goombas, people that Koopa's had de-evolved."

Before either brother could ask any more questions, Goombas wearing gasmasks approached them and gave them a burst of powder.

"What's going on here?" sputtered Mario.

"It's the de-fungus," Toad answered again. "The stuff is everywhere, choking the city. It takes all the water, it's awful."

A Goomba threw a switch and jets sprayed the party of three with chemicals which Mario and Luigi were repulsed by because of the smell. Next they were herded into a room with large drying machines that were out of order and so they were hustled on to the next stage of processing and chained to a wall with metal plaques placed around their necks. From behind a screen in front of them, two menacing looking guns were aimed at Mario and Luigi. Officers adjusted the height and angle so that red dots were squarely on the brother's foreheads.

"Oh no, no, don't!" they both started protesting, believing that they'd bought it now.

The officers pulled the triggers bus instead of the sound of gun fire there was a bright flash and mug shots were pushed out of a slot not next to the 'guns.'

"Are we dead yet?" Mario asked.

* * *

Koopa was pacing back and forth in his suite, fuming about the turn of events. His dimwitted cousins had successfully brought back the right girl this time but had lost the meteorite fragment he needed to complete his plans. In addition to that, the nimrods had been seen abducting the princess and now there were aliens out there wandering the streets of the city. Koopa was formulating a plan to find the plumbers and the rock when fate intervened and delivered them right to him when the vid-com unit on his desk started buzzing.

"What is it?" he growled as he answered the call.

"Sir, it's Simon from police dispatch. You asked to be alerted of any 1658s and we just got one so I am. Its two guys who say they're from Brooklyn. Plumbers by the look of it."

The mug shots of Mario and Luigi appeared on Koopa's monitor.

"Did you say plumbers?"

* * *

Mario and Luigi sat disconsolately in a claustrophobic wire cage in the police station cell area. The 'cells' were stacked one on top of the other and forklift trucks were used to remove and replace the cages.

"You know, Mario, there are a lot of unexplained phenomena in the world. UFOs, out of body experiences, supernatural phenomena..." said Luigi.

"I don't believe in any of that stuff," Mario grumbled.

"That's because you have a very closed mind. I mean, look around you! This is obviously not New York! Is it so hard to believe that Toad might have been right?"

"You know, you're right. Maybe Elvis is in the same joint. Hey, King! Give us a few bars of _Jailhouse Rock_!" he called out.

"OK, where do you think we are, then?"

Mario couldn't answer the question and settled for looking grumpy.

"I can guarantee you now that that my theory is more than a theory now, especially if you really are from Brooklyn," said a voice above them.

The brothers looked up and saw that Toad had been placed in the cell above them.

"Toad!" Luigi grinned.

"Oh great, now there's two of them," Mario groaned as he leaned back against the cage only to feel something tickling his neck. "What the – it's that fungus again! This place is falling apart! Was it always like this?"

"Nah, it wasn't. Sure, we've been using up our limited resources but things really started going downhill after Koopa took over twenty-one years ago. That's when the fungus first showed up as well. I think that the fungus is our old king who Koopa de-evolved. Now he's getting his revenge on Koopa by infesting the city and slowly choking the life out of it. At least, that's my theory."

"Right... theory," Mario repeated and made the universal sign for raving loony.

A guard, Simon, walked down the metal walkway into the cell area and called up at the stacks. "Mario brothers!"

"That's us!" exclaimed Mario as he shot to his feet. "We want a lawyer to get us out of this chicken coop!"

"You got one."

The two plumbers were escorted down a hallway to a rectangular room that had a table and chairs in it which were bolted to the floor. A person rose from the chair on the other side of the desk greet them, flashing the smile of a career politician or successful used car salesman.

"Hi, come in and sit down. I'm Lazard of Lazard, Conda, and Dactyl," he greeted and handed both of them a business card. He was tall and a striking figure with pale green skin and fire orange hair sculpted like ridges on his head.

"Who sent you? The city?" asked Mario.

"No, I'm from the little place in all of us that can't stand to see anyone in need or in pain."

"Hey, who's in charge here? Who's the head honcho?" Luigi asked.

"You mean El Supremo? The main man? That would be President Koopa."

"We want to see him," requested Mario.

"Actually, I don't think you do," 'Lazard' said and checked the walls before lowering his voice. "Koopa is one evil, mean egg snatching son-of-a-snake. Trust me on this. Now, I need to ask you a few questions. Procedure, you understand. As I understand it the reason you're here is because you were following a young woman, correct?"

"Yeah, that's right," Mario confirmed. "Her name is Daisy."

"What's her age?"

"We don't know, never asked. Around twenty, I'd say," Luigi answered.

"Parents?" asked 'Lazard,' his voice becoming silky.

"She's an orphan. Said she was left at a convent."

"Alright, just one more question for now. Where's the meteorite fragment?"

"The what?" asked Luigi, looking blankly at the 'lawyer.'

'Lazard' lunged across the table and grabbed Luigi by the neck, hissing, "You know what I'm talking about! Where is the rock?"

"Hey, let go of my brother!" Mario demanded and attempted to remove 'Lazard's' hands only to be knocked in the knees by Simon.

"Nobody touches President Koopa!"

"What? You're Koopa?" Luigi questioned, rubbing his neck. "But you said that he was..."

"An evil, mean egg snatching son-of-a-snake," finished Koopa with a grin. "Did I lie? Simon, take them to the Devo Chamber. Something tells me that these plumbers know more than they're letting on."

* * *

 _A/N: Another day, another chapter. What will happen to the Mario Bros. in the Devo Chamber? Will they escape? Actually, you probably already know the answer to that. As always, reviews are needed for this piece. If you have any ideas for the plot, I'd love to hear them so put them in a review or PM them. Keep on writing._

 _Knight Writer 95_


	5. The Great Escape

Chapter 5

The chamber that the brothers were taken to was high ceilinged and free of fungus, but still somewhat grungy. There was a control console to the right of the door they were shoved through being manned by two technicians and a bizarre looking chair with arm and leg clamps on rails led to a pod like device at the back of the room. This was their fate.

"You probably think of evolution as a forward progression, right?" Koopa asked. "Life starts out as primordial slime, evolves into single cell organisms, and from there to sentient lifeforms. De-evolution works in the opposite way."

"What lifeform did you evolve from?" inquired Mario.

"Tyrannosaurus Rex, the lizard king," answered Koopa, his chest swelling in pride. "Now I believe you evolved from rabbits, or something like that."

"Uh, it's monkeys, sir. They evolved from apes," a technician named Adam corrected.

"Whatever, some disgusting mammal. Either way, this is going to be interesting. But how about a demonstration for our plumbers, first?"

"Of course, President Koopa. I can send for a subject right away..."

"How about you?"

Adam's face paled. "M-me, sir?"

"Oh, don't worry, it'll just be a light zap. You won't even feel it. Guards?"

The Goomba guards quickly grabbed Adam by the arms and shoved him into the chair, locking the clamps around his wrists and ankles.

"Sir, there's been a lot of overloading tonight, perhaps I should change the stabilizing circuitry first," the other technician at the console advised.

Koopa waved off his concerns and turned back to the Mario's. "You see, this world has limited resources so it's important to recycle. Third time offenders are taken from the prison and we turn them into loyal Goombas."

"You turn them into those?" Luigi asked, looking at the Goomba guards.

Koopa merely smiled and signaled to start the de-evolution machine. The technician swallowed and turned it on. The chair shot backwards into the pod and a sound like crackling energy filled the air. The control console started sparking, shocking the technician as he monitored the process.

"It's not supposed to do that," he said to Koopa.

Koopa reached over the console and turned the dial all the way over to 'Primordial' and smiled.

The machine finished and the pod opened, releasing the chair which this time juddered forward, sparking and smoking. Fear was etched on the technician's face but it seemed unfounded as Adam looked the same as he had when he went in. Koopa looked disappointed until Adam slid out of the straps like gelatin and splattered into slime when he hit the floor. Everyone was horrified at what had happened except Koopa.

"Y-you killed him," stuttered Luigi.

"Hardly. He's just been turned into a slime mold. That stuff is practically immortal," the dictator replied nonchalantly.

At that point Mario had had enough and delivered his best punch to Koopa's gut but the dictator barely moved. "What was that? Is that the hardest the rabbit can punch?"

A Goomba moved in with a stun rod but Mario ducked, causing the rod to hit Koopa who stumbled back, slipped on the slime that was once Adam and fell into the chair. Luigi was quick to leap into action and fastened the restraints on Koopa while Mario managed to wrestle the stunner from the Goomba and tossed it to Luigi.

"Turn that thing on and let's get out of here!" he said to Luigi who gladly used the stick to stun Simon, ward off the technician and activate the machine, sending Koopa hurtling back into the pod.

"Turn it off!" he yelled from in the pod.

The de-evolution machine sparkled and cracked and Simon, after recovering from the electric shock, rushed to the console and started yanking out wires while Goombas rushed to help their leader. "Who knows how to fix this?"

"He's on Koopa's shoe!" the technician exclaimed, trying to override the controls.

In the chaos that they had created, the Mario brothers took full advantage of the situation to hightail it out of the camber.

Finally the Goombas managed to free Koopa who pushed them all away as soon as the restraints were released, seeming none the worse for the experience. For a second, though, his eyes became reptilian slits.

"Sir, perhaps it would be best if you sit down," suggested Simon.

"I'm fine! Where are the plumbers?"

"Um... they're escaping."

"WHAT? STOP THEM, YOU IDIOTS!" Koopa yelled, his head seeming to change and swell subtly.

* * *

Mario and Luigi ran down a bare hallway, lights flashing and an alarm going off all around them.

"Wait, we have to find Daisy!" Luigi suddenly exclaimed, skidding to a halt.

Mario was quick to try and get his brother moving again. "Are you crazy? If we stick around here then we're pond scum! Now come on and let's get out of here before we're found!"

The door at the end of the hallway opened and a pair of Goombas walked through, blinked at the Mario brothers, and leveled their weapons at them. Fireballs roared down the hallway, missing the plumbers and blew large chunks out of the wall. Mario and Luigi backtrack but Goombas were on the other side of the other door.

"This way!" Luigi exclaimed, grabbing Mario's arm and dragged him through a door to the stairwell.

Fireballs continued to ricochet down the stairwell which bottomed out and led to another door which Mario threw himself against, almost falling into the parking garage of the station. A wagon had just pulled in and the officers were pulling the convicts out of the vehicle and corralling them into the station, necessitating the brothers need to stay hidden. They weaved their way through the rows of parked cars until they found one with the doors still open.

The Goombas threw open the stairwell door to the parking garage and looked around for their quarry which was not in sight.

"What do we do?" asked Luigi.

"First, we're gonna steal this car. Second, I'm driving."

Mario and Luigi hurriedly got into the scarred police vehicle but were stopped from escaping by the unfamiliar controls.

"You don't know how to drive this," Luigi said.

"A car is a car, I'll figure this out."

"Well you'd better figure it out quick. Those Goombas may not be bright but even they won't miss us in here."

Mario threw a switch and the Tesla balls on top of the rods sparked against the mesh grid.

"You did it!" exclaimed Luigi.

"Of course, now let's get out of here!"

The car lurched forward, garnering the attention of the Goombas who turned and automatically started firing at the fleeing vehicle as it hit the ramp. Ahead of the brothers, a gate arm was descending but Mario floored the accelerator and splintered it before fishtailing into traffic.

"Luigi, see if you can find the sirens on this thing," asked Mario as he weaved through the other beat up cars.

 _"_ _All units be advised, aliens escaping the Metro Division Police Headquarters. Use of unnecessary force is authorized."_

"What, now there are aliens involved in this mess?" Luigi asked.

"Luigi, we're the aliens!" Mario pointed out.

"Really? Cool!"

"Yeah, you can write about this in your memoirs, now where's the siren?"

The brother's mug shots appeared on the onboard monitor.

"Is that us?" asked Luigi. "You look terrible, Mario."

"You don't look so good yourself."

Suddenly the sirens on their stolen police car burst to life and cars started swerving to get out of their way, sometimes causing a collision in their frantic attempts to stay clear. It wasn't long before another pair of sirens pierced the air and the brothers looked in dismay as two police cars pull alongside them on either side.

"Mario, their pointing their weapons at us," Luigi warned as the cop in the car on his side pointed his flame launcher out the window directly at them.

"I know, this cop's doing the same thing."

"What are we gonna do? I don't want to be flambé."

"I'll tell you what we're gonna do... this!"

Mario stomped the brakes as both officers fired at a target that suddenly dropped out of view, meaning that both police cars annihilated each other in brilliant bursts of flame.

"Yes!" exclaimed Luigi, thumping Mario on the shoulder exuberantly.

"Now this is driving!" Mario grinned as he hit the gas pedal.

Their excitement was short lived, however, with what came over the radio next.

 _"_ _Escaped aliens are headed west on Koopa Boulevard, approaching Koopa Parkway near off ramp at Avenue of the Koopas."_

"We have to get off of the freeway," Mario muttered as they approached a fork in the road. One road led to the parkway and the other led into a tunnel that had a warning sign reading 'DANGER! – NO THRUWAY!' "Which way road should we take?"

"Take the Parkway," advised Luigi.

"Right," Mario said and turned to go down the tunnel, shattering the barrier. The inside of the tunnel was encrusted with fungus which clung to the windshield and started to obscure the brother's vision.

"Perfect," laughed Luigi as they plunged through the tunnel.

"What do you mean 'perfect?' You wanted to take the Parkway!"

"But I wanted the tunnel, so I said 'Parkway' to get you to take it."

Mario growled at being tricked as the headlights illuminating the tunnel and the engine started to fade.

"We're off the grid, we've lost power!" Luigi exclaimed. "Check the dashboard, maybe there's an onboard power source!"

Mario started scanning the dashboard as best he could in the fading light until he saw a switch labeled 'Aux. Power Unit.' He flipped the switch and the lights and engine came back and they heard the hum of a dynamo.

"We've only got thirty-five miles," Luigi read from a display.

"We may not even make it that far, this fungus is a real nuisance," said Mario as more fungus wrapped around the car.

"Hey, I think I see some light ahead! We're approaching the end of the tunnel!"

"About time, too. If this fungus gets anymore thick, we're gonna be sealed in."

The light grew brighter but as it turned out, it wasn't the end of the tunnel as much as it was a metaphorical train bearing down on them. When the police cruiser reached the end of the tunnel there was a sudden loss of solid ground and the vehicle took a plunge toward hard ground. Just as it looked to the brothers like they had had it, the fungus that had wrapped around the front of the car pulled taught and jerked them to a stop, suspending them just a few feet above the rocky ground.

"Woah, did you see that?" Luigi inquired. "The fungus saved us."

Mario was still too shaken up to respond properly but did roll his eyes.

* * *

Back at Koopa Tower, Koopa had returned to his suite and was examining himself in a mirror while Lena watched.

"After coming out of the machine, do you feel any different?" she asked.

"Not at all," Koopa answered. "In fact, I feel better than ever! I feel invigorated, energized, I feel like I'm ten years younger! But what about those plumbers? How's the hunt going?"

"We haven't heard anything yet, but they'll be caught no doubt," Lena said while sidling up to Koopa and running her hands across his chest.

"Fine, the plumbers can wait. Have a guard collect the princess. It's past time that I met her face to face."

Jealously flashed through Lena's eyes. "So you're sure she's the one?"

"Of course, the brain scan proves it," he stated.

"So you don't care that the plumbers managed to make you look like a fool?"

Koopa rounded on Lena, anger etched onto his face. "Nobody makes a fool out of Koopa! No one! The only reason they escaped is because I am surrounded by incompetents!"

As he yelled, Koopa began to regress, his features becoming more reptilian and visibly startling Lena.

"What are you looking at?" he asked and ran his hand across his face. But by the time he turned to look back in the mirror his facial features had returned to normal.

* * *

The door to the holding area the Brooklyn girls stayed in opened and Lena waked in, flanked by a Goomba.

"You," she said, pointing to Daisy. "Koopa wants to see you."

"Hey, you can't just pull one of us out of here," Pauline spoke up. "What does he want with her?"

"Dinner."

"Well aren't we special?"

* * *

Daisy was escorted to Koopa's suite by two guards who prodded her in before closing the door and departing. She had had a do over before being brought here. Daisy had been bathed, her hair washed and combed, and had been given a lavender dress to wear. The lights in the suite had been dimmed some, casting shadows and giving the room a seductive glow.

Daisy took a few tentative steps forward before a noise in a dark corner startled her. She faintly heard what sounded like animal noises before she sees a shadow on the wall that looks like no animal she had seen before. Finally the animal broke cover and Daisy was startled to see what looked like a type of dinosaur. It had a white underbelly, green skin, ridges on its back a shade of red, and came up to her waist. The small dinosaur fixed its eyes on Daisy, looking just as frightened as she was.

"Don't be afraid. Yoshi won't hurt you."

Daisy turned to see Koopa standing behind her, his pale green skin contrasting with his black lizard skin suit.

"You can touch him if you want, just try not to move your fingers around like a small wounded animal."

"I can't believe it," she trembled as she lightly stroked Yoshi. "Dinosaurs went extinct millions of years ago."

"Correct. A meteorite did it and more. Its impact with the earth created a parallel world which we are in now."

"Who are you?" asked Daisy as she stood up and turned to face Koopa.

"I am Koopa, master of all that you see," he gestured out the window to the metropolis below. "A few miserable streets and endless desert."

"You should see your city from street level. It's disgusting, rotted, and crumbling."

"Oh, I hardly venture so low but I am aware of what it's like. Welcome home, Daisy."

"Home? What do you mean?"

Koopa smiled. "Come now, Daisy, surely you knew in the dimension you grew up in that you never truly belonged. You're a child of this universe, your parents came from here."

"My parents? Are they here?"

"I'm afraid not. Your mother and father were part of the ruling elite and were killed in an uprising here twenty-one years ago. Your mother was a Portal Keeper, guardians of the gateway to the other world but she betrayed that trust."

"Why did you bring me here? What do you need from me?"

"What do I need? I need your help, Daisy. Every day our resources dwindle and the city falls apart a little bit more. You've seen what it's like down there. We're on our last legs here, that's why we need you. More specifically, that's why we need the rock that you have."

"You mean the crystal that I wear around my neck?"

"Yes, that is exactly what I mean. Unfortunately it has fallen into the possession of your two plumber friends who have run off. We're in the process of looking for them but I have yet to hear anything. It's unfortunate really, all I need is that rock and everyone can go home."

"Why? What do you need the rock for?"

"It's a fragment of the meteorite that created this dimension and with it I can merge the separate universes and save our species from extinction. As the last of the Portal Keepers, you have their unique genetic traits and hold the key to saving us all."

"How can I do all that?"

"Come with me."

Koopa led her to his private elevator which took them down a few levels to a room that was dominated by computers, other equipment, and a large sphere that was in the center of it all.

"The Portal Keepers guarded their secrets and the power of the meteorite jealously, but this most of all," explained Koopa as he brought Daisy to a console that had a palm scanner on it.

When Daisy's hand made contact with the scanner, the machine lit up and started scanning her body. Upon completion and confirmation that Daisy was a Portal Keeper, parts of the metal sphere started moving, twisting and turning like a puzzle until it opened to reveal another sphere with an indentation in the shape of Daisy's meteorite piece.

"What is it?" she asked.

"It's the machine that will allow me to save our species by merging the dimensions."

They took the elevator back up to Koopa's suite where Daisy sat down on the couch, slightly stunned by all that she had learned.

"All that time that you were in the other world, it must have been hard for you to feel that you belonged," said Koopa as he sat down next to Daisy who nodded mutely at his words. "Drawn to and excited to things that you didn't understand, things that belong to my world... _your_ world."

Daisy had become mesmerized by Koopa's voice and became even more so when she turned her head to face him and was staring into suddenly reptilian eyes. The spell was broken, though, when the door buzzer went off.

Koopa growled as Daisy shook her head, clearing it. "Come in!"

Lena entered, seeing the position the two were in and couldn't contain the jealous llook that she flashed towards Daisy.

"What is it?"

"It's the plumbers, they've left the city and are in the desert."

"They are? Get Larry and Roy, fast!"

"What about her?"

"She's inconsequential now, I've got what I need from her."

"As you wish," said Lena coldly and departed.

* * *

A/N: And here's chapter 5. I thought it would make more sense the Koopa would use a machine to merge the worlds than just reconnect Daisy's piece with the main body of the meteorite. Hope you continue to like this fic. As always, reviews are requested and always welcome. I think I'm roughly halfway done by now and I can assure you that the climax I have in mind is one that will far outdo the movie. You don't want to miss it so hit that review button!


	6. Update

Hello fellow authors! This Author's Note is to say that I have been hired full time at a camp for the summer. As such updates will not be as plentiful as I had originally hoped. I will do my best to update this fic as soon as I can but no guarantees that a new chapter will be up within the month or even the next. I am experiencing an incredibly annoying bout of writer's block at the moment. Thank you for your continued patience and for following and or favoriting this work. Keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


	7. Where There's a Will

Ch. 6: Where There's a Will...

"You summoned us, cousin?" asked Roy as he and Larry entered Koopa's suite.

"Yes, I did," Koopa confirmed, flashing the same smile he had to the Mario's when he pretended to be a lawyer. "I have a special mission for the two of you, and this time there must be no mistakes!"

"Of course, anything you want cousin! What is you want us to do?" exclaimed Larry.

"The plumbers have taken the unfinished tunnel into the desert. I want you to go out there, find them, kill them if need be, and bring back the rock."

"It shall be done, you can count on us, cousin!" proclaimed Roy.

"No, I can hardly count on you two dimwits for anything. That's why I'm going to make sure that this time, you can't mess up."

Koopa hit a button on his desk and immediately two officers burst through the door and restrained Larry and Roy.

"Officers, take them to the Devo Chamber," ordered Koopa.

"The Devo Chamber? Cousin, no! You can't! You can't turn us into Goombas!" protested Larry and Roy as they were forcefully dragged out of the suite.

 **SMB**

"You can't do this, cousin, please! I haven't done anything to deserve this, I have rights!" Roy rambled as he was secured to the chair in the Devo Chamber.

"If I am to depend on the two of you to carry out this assignment correctly, then I'll just have to make you smarter," Koopa said under his breath as he flipped the switch on the console to 'Evolve' and turned the dial to 'Advanced.'

The chair moved back on the rails into the pod which hissed and sparked but Roy's yells could still be heard. After a few seconds, the pod opened and Roy came out, not a bit different than when he went in.

"Oh my," he said as he saw Koopa. "A megalomaniacal dictator. How fascinating. That system should come back into style sometime this... epoch."

Koopa snapped his fingers and immediately the guards released Roy and secured Larry in his place.

"Cousin, no! Not me! Not me! I'd make a terrible Goomba!" he pleaded as the chair hurtled back into the pod and released him a few seconds later. "How peculiar... I feel transformed."

"What do you think, brother, an agreeable transmogrification, yes?"

"That's enough, both of you," Koopa spoke up. "Both of you, go to the desert and find the plumbers!"

"But cousin, that hardly seems logical. Perhaps we should stay here and formulate our own strategy for carrying out this operation," suggested Roy.

"I'll tell you what seems logical to me right now. If you do not return with the plumbers and the rock, then I will personally kill both of you in ways that don't even exist in your nightmares!"

During his outburst, Koopa's head had again started to swell and change but returned too normal just as quickly as it had grown. As for Larry and Roy, they may have been a lot smarter now, but Koopa was still stronger.

"Very good point, cousin."

"Since you put it that way..."

"Interesting syllogism, don't you think?"

"Definitely, it works on multiple levels..."

As the brothers had been talking back of forth they had been backing up towards the door and tripped over themselves some in their haste to get out.

 **SMB**

"I said the Parkway," Luigi said as he and Mario walked back to the city. The sky in this world was a sickly yellow and heat waves radiated off the land. Up above them was the city. It looked like Manhattan, being an island but it was smaller and surrounded by waste and the desert. Koopa's tower was so tall that it's very top became obscured in thick soup like smog that hung permanently overhead.

"But you wanted the tunnel!" Mario argued back. "Go ahead, pick a direction! Over there looks good. We could die there. But wait, I have a feeling! We should die there! Hey, maybe if we're lucky, we'll make it back to Dinohattan and then get killed! I coulda been at home with a cold beer and watching the Knicks."

"But Mario, you hate the Knicks."

"Well I like them now!"

"All right, fine! This is all my fault! I see how it is, it's dump on your little brother day! Well I'm sorry we followed Daisy, I'm sorry I became smitten with her, I'm sorry I got feelings and desires! I'm sorry we got shocked, poked, and defungized! It's all my fault! I made them do it to you, I made them evil, and you know what? I even invented sand!" exclaimed Luigi and scooped up a handful.

"Yeah? Good idea, eat some!" Mario yelled and got his own fistful.

After that the argument fell into a sandbox fight with both brothers hurling sand and insults at each other.

 **SMB**

"There they are, it's the plumbers!" exclaimed Larry as he spied the Mario brothers through a pair of binoculars.

"Great, let's grab them and get them and the stone back to Koopa!"

Larry sat back down as Roy hit the accelerator and attempted to steer the shoddy six wheeled vehicle.

"You're doing it wrong," said Larry.

"I'm doing fine. I'm getting the hang of this."

"No you're not, let me drive."

"You'd be no better than me at this."

"Maybe I won't."

"Maybe you will. Besides, I have the most experience right now."

"You have a point," Larry conceded.

"Good, I'm glad we gave reached a unanimous decision without resorting to fisticuffs to determine superiorit-EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"

As Roy was finishing his sentence, the six wheeler crested a rather large dune and dropped into a sudden and rapid descent on the other side. The vehicle crashed to the sand hard, shaking its two occupants who held onto the framework of their transport in a daze.

As fate would have it, they landed not too far away from the still fighting Mario brothers who froze where they were when they saw the vehicle crest the top of the dune.

"Quick, get them!" growled Mario.

The brothers quickly approached the still dazed Larry and Roy but were stopped by the sound of another dynamo and the sight of a buggy with outsized wheels cresting the edge of the dune and stopping a few feet from them. The driver was wearing goggles and a bandana which he removed to reveal his smiling face.

"Toad!" exclaimed Luigi, a grin of his own on his face.

"Hey, Mario brothers! How'd you get out here?"

"It's a long story," Mario said.

"Well, there'll be time to hear it later. Here, you left these behind at the station," said Toad as he tossed something to the brothers.

"Our belts, thanks!" Mario smiled as he and Luigi strapped their tool belts on.

"How'd you get out of the slammer?" questioned Luigi.

"Simple, I found a bribe bail bondsman. But let's take care of your little problem before it becomes a big one," answered Toad and pointed at the recovering Larry and Roy.

 **SMB**

"Hoodlums! Ruffians!"

"Picaroons! Hooligans!"

"Yell all you want boys, nobody can hear you out here," said Mario calmly as he walked around Roy and Larry who had been restrained with his and Luigi's drain snakes.

"Now where's Daisy?" Luigi asked.

"She's in the tower in the Goomba barracks with the other girls we took from your world. But you'll never get to her, Koopa's security is too tight!" Larry answered.

"Then you'll just have to get us in."

"It can't be done!" Roy spoke up. "Koopa won't let us back in without the rock!"

"Are you talking about the crystal thing she wore?"

"Yes, it's a fragment of the meteorite that chipped off on impact sixty-five million years ago and caused the divergence in our dimensions. When it's used in conjunction with a machine built by the Portal Keepers it will be able to unite the dimensions."

"That's correct, and the merge will allow Koopa to invade. Your world will be overrun by Goombas."

"I don't get it," Mario frowned. "Why doesn't he just come through the same way you clowns did?"

"You mean the gateway?" answered Roy. "No way, it's too small and dangerous. Also, Koopa knows that it's not ideal to deploy his army. With the gate's location, it would be too easy to cut off his access to your world again."

"What do you mean by 'again'?"

"The gate was active years ago but then it got sealed off until now. Something on your side blasted it open," supplied Larry.

"Santini," growled Mario.

"We gotta find that rock and Daisy," Luigi said.

"Yeah, and you two are going to help us, right?"

"With our newly evolutionarily enhanced brains, this does seem like the right choice to make. What do you think, Roy?"

"I believe that we can come to an arrangement that will be mutually beneficial to all parties involved."

"Great, now we just have to find that cop who took Daisy's crystal."

"This officer of yours, was it a female, black, and corpulent?" inquired Roy.

"Yeah, she was," Mario answered.

"Ah! That's Bertha!" exclaimed Larry. "We know where you can find her and we have an idea on how to get back into the city undetected, but we'll have to move at night."

"I think I'm thinking what you're thinking!" Roy smiled. "Does your idea involve the Snifits and their sludge-gulpers?"

"Yes, it does!"

"Hold up there, who and their what now?" asked Luigi.

"We'll be using one of the Snifits' sludge-gulpers to reenter the city. But we'll need a place to stay until the evening to make our move."

"I can help you there," Toad said. "My place isn't too far from here."

 **SMB**

Toad took everyone to his home in a disused quarry. Every inch of the walls in Toad's hide away was covered in paraphernalia ranging from miner's lamps to bike frames to pick axes to bizarre and alien looking musical instruments.

Toad approached a cart in the back of his hole and pulled out a few bottles that were black with age and popped the stoppers. "Here you go, the last of the sixty-two."

"Thanks, are there any glasses?" asked Mario as he accepted his bottle.

"Sniff it, don't drink it," Toad advised. "If you drink this stuff you'll suffer from profound melancholia for a week."

Mario took a cautious whiff and tried to hide his disgust as he placed the bottle down on a rickety table which was quickly snatched up by Larry and Roy. Toad walked over to an old TV set which he switched on. The station was the Propaganda Channel and it was playing images of Koopa and praising his policies and leadership.

"What's the deal with Koopa?" inquired Mario. "Ever since we got here we've been seeing his image all over. Vote for Koopa the Statesman, Koopa the Cruel, Koopa the Stud. Does anyone ever run against him?"

"Koopa the Sensitive ran three years ago but he only got three percent," answered Larry.

"I mean someone other than Koopa."

"Oh, then no," said Roy. "Koopa wouldn't like that very much."

"So you can elect anyone as long as it's Koopa?" Luigi picked up.

"That's the way it works," sighed Toad.

"What kind of a messed up system is that?"

"It's called democracy."

"And it's always been this way?" Mario continued.

"Naw, back in the good days we had a king. But then Koopa took over and de-evolved him into the fungus that's choking the city like I told you back in the lock up," Toad replied before taking another sniff from his bottle.

"How much of that stuff are you doing?"

 **SMB**

"Hey, Mario?"

Mario grunted in response to Luigi's prodding.

"Mario, whenever we get in trouble like this, well not like this but trouble back in our own dimenstion, do you ever wonder what pop would say or do?"

"Yeah, I do. You know what he'd say right now?"

"No. What?"

"Shut the hell up and go to sleep."

"All right, if we're going to get back into the city the time to move is now," said Roy, interrupting the brothers' snoozing.

"I'll give you a lift to the dump," offered Toad.

"Thanks, we appreciate it," said Mario as he checked to make sure he had all his tools.

"It's no problem, just make sure you kick Koopa's ass."

"Actually, if things don't go our way I think that he'll be the one kicking our asses."

"C'mon, Mario! We're the Mario Brothers, we can handle this no problem at all," Luigi grinned as he slapped his sibling on the back.

"I hope you're right," Mario muttered as he followed everyone out to Toad's buggy.

 **SMB**

"Here we are, the city dump," proclaimed Toad as he stopped his buggy at the limits of the dump.

The dump was situated well beyond the city and into the wasteland. The silhouette of the city was visible in the background, lit up by the lights. Koopa's tower stretched tall above every other building. Also visible from the dump was a statue on a raised part of the land. It looked like the Statue of Liberty but wad spikes on the crown that went down its back and the torch was held down in one hand while the other thrust a burning book into the air.

"Finally, that buggy almost broke my back," Mario moaned as he got out and cracked his back.

"I thought it was fun," Luigi smiled as he walked up next to his brother. "Are you coming with us, Toad?"

"No, I'm not."

"What? Why not?" asked Luigi as he turned around to face their friend.

"Look at me, Luigi. I'm not gonna be any good to you where you're going. I'm an herbivore, I'm not confrontational by nature. I'd be more of a hindrance than a help. But I do wish you the best of luck," Toad said genuinely and held out his hand.

Luigi reluctantly took the offered hand and shook it. "Thanks, Toad, for everything."

"It was my pleasure. Now get going, you have a girl to rescue."

Toad hit the accelerator and his buggy made a buzzing sound as it sped off back into the night.

"OK, what's the plan?" Luigi asked as he came up behind Mario.

"Grab your wrench and follow me."

 **SMB**

A pair of Snifits were using long poles with claws on the end to pull the garbage bags out of their Sludge-Gulper when they felt someone tap them on the shoulder. They turned to look and barely had time to see a pipe wrench flying towards their faces before they were knocked out.

"Success!" laughed Mario.

"Not bad at all," Roy complimented. "Now get their masks and let's get to the city!"

Mario and Luigi grabbed the Snifit's masks and got into the Sludge-Gulper, hoping they would be able to make it past the guard post and into the city. The large large machine shuddered and made a noise before lurching forward and carrying its occupants towards the guard post.

At the guard station the Goombas waved the plumbers through, not noticing that their clothes were not the normal Snifit uniform.

"We made it past!" exclaimed Luigi as he tore his mask off in jubilation and no small amount of relief.

"Yes, I'm brilliant!" Larry grinned as he and Roy sat up from their crouched hiding position.

"Where to next?" asked Mario, still grinning from ear to ear.

"Next stop, the Boom-Boom Bar! It's a hangout joint for cops and Goombas."

"Well we don't look like either," said Luigi.

"Yeah, and I haven't had a shower since Brooklyn," added Mario.

"Then we'll need to stop by our place first."

* * *

A/N: I LIVE! Yes, I am back with another update for you all at last! Hope I haven't lost you or ticked you off permanently with the delay. Also hope that you liked this chapter and that this fic continues to meet and exceed expectations (but let's be honest, the movie set the bar really low). The climax is fast approaching and I can guarantee a more spectacular finish than the movie delivered. In fact, my climax is based off the one they wanted to do for the movie but couldn't because their budget ran out. So keep hitting that review button and I'll get the next chapter our as fast as I can. Keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


	8. The Tower

Ch. 7:The Tower

At night, the Boom-Boom Bar came to life. Lights were flashing, music pounded, and the patrons writhed and shook to the beat. Mario and Luigi entered the bar with Larry and Roy. The brothers were trying to look as sharp as possible in clothes that evoked the old zoot suit from their world. Mario wore a scaly dark red suit while Luigi had been given a lizard green number. Both of them had slicked their hair back and the grease made it shine under the pulsing, rotating and changing lights of the dance floor. Larry and Roy had also put on sharp suits and chunky turquoise jewelry that made them look like Aztec pimps.

"Don't forget to check your belts," reminded Larry who motioned towards the hatcheck.

By the dance floor a fight suddenly broke out between some a cop and a Goomba.

"Real redneck joint," Mario commented.

"Cops don't like Goombas, and Goombas don't like cops," Roy said as an explanation.

"I don't see her," said Luigi as they scanned the room.

"Just keep looking. If she's not here now, she will be soon," assured Roy as he and Larry headed off to the bar.

"Serpent's Hiss, my good man," Larry ordered. "To the downfall of Koopa, the sooner the better!"

Mario and Luigi milled around the perimeter of the dance floor, keeping their eyes open for Bertha before Mario spotted her.

"There she is!" he said and pointed to the other end of the floor where Bertha was navigating her way around the edge of the sea of dancers. She was out of uniform, having squeezed into a tight spiky rubber like dress. The crystal was still around her neck, its facets catching the strobe light, refracting it, and drawing the eye.

"What's the plan?"

"Just leave this to me. Like I told you before, no woman can resist the charm of a Mario."

Mario walked onto the dance floor, leaving Luigi to keep an eye out for signs that anyone recognized them.

 **SMB**

As Luigi tried to keep a low profile and Mario attempted to steal back the rock, Lena walked into the Boom-Boom Bar dressed in a tight and tantalizing glossy black lizard skin dress. She paused in the doorway, her face a mixture of contempt and curiosity before striding up to the bar and ordering a drink.

"Viper's Fang, straight up."

"Haven't seen you in here before," the bartender said as he poured the drink.

"I'm slumming tonight," Lena answered curtly before casting her gaze around the room. Larry and Roy caught her eye, down at the other end of the bar, knocking back drinks and talking about how the downfall of Koopa was nigh. She bristled at this, steely determination locking into place on her face and she asked the bartender where the phone was. She was directed to an alcove near the bar where she deposited her Koopons and called Koopa's hotline.

Once satisfied that the two morons would get what they deserved, she returned to her seat where she eyed up some of the male patrons before recognizing another face in the crowd. It was one of the plumbers that had been causing so many problems for Koopa. He was staring onto the dance floor and when she followed his gaze, she saw the other plumber who was dancing with a heavy-set woman and seemed to be trying to finagle something off her neck. Leena looked more closely and her heart skipped a beat. It was the rock! She felt herself swell with pride at the sight and thought that soon she would be able to prove to Koopa that he didn't need the princess to achieve his ultimate goal when he had her.

The thought made her smile even wider.

 **SMB**

Luigi was trying to not squirm under the gaze of a woman with auburn hair sitting at the bar that made him uncomfortable when Mario stumbled into him.

"Hey, did you get the rock?" he asked.

Mario grinned and held up the crystal on its cord in answer.

"Yes! How'd you manage it?" exclaimed Luigi.

"Don't ask..." was all Mario said. "Let's get out of here before that lady finds us and knocks us into the land of Oz."

The brothers turned to the bar to get Larry and Roy only to see them being restrained by uniformed officers and Goombas lumbering through the crowd towards them.

"Uh oh, how do we get out of this?" Luigi asked nervously.

"Like Mario's. Listen, this is the play..." Mario pulled Luigi closer and whispered to him what the play was. "Got it?"

"Yeah, let's do it."

"All right, hike!"

Just as the first Goomba was upon them, Mario threw the rock over its head to Luigi who had maneuvered behind who caught it and moved quickly to stay out of reach of both Goombas who were now focused on him. Mario moved in the direction of the bar signaling to Luigi to throw it. Luigi launched the pendant into the air again but his aim was off. The twirling stone went over Mario's head who quickly backpedaled and threw himself after it, lading hard on the floor but catching the rock. The elation was short lived, though, when a boot came down on his wrist. His gaze was drawn upwards, past the leather boots, creamy toned thighs, short skirt and spiked belt, bare midriff, bosom and to the taunting victorious face of Lena.

"Nice try, plumber," she grinned as she plucked the crystal out of Mario's hand.

Luigi ran up behind his brother and pulled him to his feet, saying, "Come on, let's get out of here!"

"I don't have the rock!"

"Forget it! Let's go! Everyone here's a cop or Goomba!"

As Lena shouted orders to a Goomba captain, Mario and Luigi pushed and shoved their way through the throng of people towards the exit when they were suddenly stopped by Bertha by the hatcheck station.

"In here," she said. "There are more Goombas outside."

The brothers complied quickly and Bertha closed and blocked the door just before the Goombas could get in.

"How do we get of here?" Luigi questioned as he looked around. There wasn't another door and only a skylight that they couldn't reach.

"Use the Stompers," said Bertha and pointed to some shelves where the shoes were stacked. "Grab a belt of cartridges, there's a port in the back of the boots they go in. Just click your heels together and they'll launch you through the skylight and out of here. And don't tell anyone I said this but if you can take down Koopa you do it!"

Mario and Luigi nodded in the affirmative and quickly put on the pneumatic boots.

"Don't forget your tools either. Pop wouldn't approve," reminded Mario as he found their belts and tossed Luigi his and grabbed two crates.

"What are these for?" Luigi asked as he took the one offered to him.

"That skylight's not open and I doubt you want any lacerations on your skull."

With the crates held above their heads, they clicked their heels together as instructed and the Stompers made a rising series of beeps before rocketing the brothers straight up through the skylight and dropping them safely down on the roof.

"Yes!"

Both brothers high five each other and jump around in jubilation.

"Let's get to Koopa's tower and rescue Daisy! We've got an invasion to stop!" Luigi exclaimed and ran to find a way off the roof.

There was a fungus covered walkway connecting the building they were on to another. They were halfway across when Luigi noticed something in the fungus.

"Mario, wait, look!" There was a small black ball slightly larger than a golf ball that had a fuse, tiny feet, a wind-up key on the side, and 'eyes' painted on in white. "I think it wants me to take it!"

"Luigi, quit fiddling with the fungus and move before we get caught!" Mario pleaded and dragged Luigi with him but not before the younger sibling had grabbed the odd little bomb. Their progress was impeded, though, by two police officers cutting them off at the end of the walkway.

"Cops!" Mario exclaimed. "Quick, turn around!"

"No good, Mario, there's Goombas!" Luigi informed. "We're trapped!"

"No we're not, there's a Sludge-Gulper!" pointed Mario to the Gulper that was about to pass underneath them. "Jump... now!"

Mario and Luigi jumped off the walkway, both keeping their eyes closed, and plopped safely into the back of the Sludge-Gulper, surrounded by foul smelling garbage bags.

"What a way to get to Koopa Tower," muttered Mario.

"At least we survived," Luigi pointed out.

"How are we even gonna get in? I have two words for that: im-possible!"

"Nothing's impossible, Mario. Improbable, unlikely, but never impossible."

"I hope you're right."

As fortune would have it, the Sludge-Gulper the brothers had jumped in was still going about the city collecting the garbage and its next stop was imposing fortress like Koopa Tower. Mario and Luigi jumped off the Gulper and quickly used one of Mario's tools to force open a loose vent and crawl into the building. They ended up in a locker room that connected to a boiler room. Mario forced open one locker and grinned as took out two pairs of maintenance coveralls and handed a green and blue one to Luigi while keeping the red and blue one for himself.

"Finally, I felt ridiculous in those clothes," Mario groaned as he and Luigi looked around the boiler room with a professional interest.

It was dominated by heavy metal, stairs and walkways, brass and copper gauges and controls. Pistons thrusted, steam hissed, and there was the occasional blast of a furnace. But what really appalled the brothers was the sight of the rusting metal, greening copper, and yet more fungus.

"This is a plumber's nightmare! These pipes haven't been serviced in years!" exclaimed Mario.

"It must have been a non-union job," stated Luigi as they stepped over to a control board that had a computerized schematic of the tower's floor plans, stairwells, elevator shafts, and ventilation.

"There, that's the main vent pipe," said Mario as he stabbed a finger at the screen and swiveled around to point at the pipe behind him. "It goes all the way to the top of the building."

"But how are we getting up it?"

"They have to have a way to clean that sucker out," Mario answered as he walked around the pipe and found a door in it. He opened it and peered inside, seeing an endless vertigo inducing circular shaft with ladder rungs on the side. He took his head out to tell Luigi they had their way up when a blaring klaxon went off accompanied by flashing red lights above the doors.

"They're on to us!" Luigi exclaimed.

"Yeah, let's see if we can slow 'em down."

They raced across the room, dodging pipes and hissing valves to reach the main electrical circuit board. Mario whistled as he eyed the tangled mess of different colored wires and fuses. Which one did he pull out? This one? No, perhaps this one? This one looked good. That one – why not? He crossed his fingers and yanked it out in a shower of sparks.

"Lock off those valves over there," Mario indicated a bank of pipes across from them as he went back to his sabotage. "It's the heating system, we'll freeze them."

"Someone's gonna make triple overtime fixing all of this," said Luigi as he grabbed the knob but yelped and jerked his hand back from the extreme heat.

"Here," Mario said and handed Luigi a tool to help lock the valve. "It's like Pop said, keep your tools at your side and they'll never let you down. I think that should keep the Goombas and guards busy enough. Let's go!"

Mario and Luigi got into the shaft and began the long ascent to the top of the tower to rescue Daisy and stop the invasion of their world.

* * *

A/N: And here's the next chapter for you all. Hope you enjoy it as usual. Please leave a review like always, the climax is quickly approaching and I have big plans for it. Like I've said before, it's guaranteed to be better than the movie. See you next time. Keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


	9. The Ascent

Ch. 8: The Ascent

In the main lobby of Koopa Tower, red lights flashed and the klaxon blared as security forces scrambled as a security chief barked orders.

"There are intruders in the building! Check every floor, check the elevators, check the supply bays!" The chief only stopped issuing orders when the radio on his belt buzzed with a call from Koopa. "President Koopa!"

 _"_ _What is going on?"_

"Sir, there are saboteurs in the building."

 _"_ _What have they sabotaged?"_

"The heating system has stopped working and the electrical system of the tower is going haywire. It looks like we'll need an army of plumbers and electricians to fix the system. We have few working elevators but we're doing our best to find the intruders, sir!"

 _"_ _Very good, keep me informed of the hunt. Koopa out."_

 **SMB**

Koopa smiled as he leaned back in his chair in his opulent office. He had Daisy and he would soon have the rock and the plumbers' heads on plaques. All was right in his world. The doors to the presidential office opened, interrupting his daydream and Lena strode in, a victorious grin on her face as something sparkled in her clutched hand, catching Koopa's eye.

"I believe you've been searching for this," she whispered as she slowly opened her hand, exposing the rock.

Koopa stared at it before reverently picking it up and holding it to the light. It was magnificent.

"One more thing," purred Lena. "I caught Larry and Roy preaching your overthrow in the Boom-Boom Bar."

"That was a major mistake for those two. Where are they now?"

"They're being held in a holding cell on this floor under Goomba guard."

"Have them taken to the devo chamber and de-evolve them into primordial slime. Then give the order to pass out the devo guns to the Goombas and have the Portal Keeper equipment moved to the impact sight. The time to merge the dimensions is upon us."

Koopa kissed Lena ferociously, leaving her breathless before striding out of the office to see someone very special.

 **SMB**

The large white room was damp, smelled weird, and lit only by a few flickering overhead lights which cast eerie shadows. In the center of the room was equipment that looked like it could have been an early prototype of the de-evolution machine. The room was heavily infested with fungus, in the center of which was an inverted cone completely covered in the fungus and looked to be the nucleus. A slimy ball like mass of the fungus hung from the cone. In this lighting the fungus glistened and sparkled with an internal iridescence. It writhed constantly as though it were a living intelligence.

The hanging ball retreated up into the cone when the double doors opened and Koopa walked in.

"My old adversary... I shall soon be rid of you forever. You can have Dinohattan, squeeze the life out of it! It doesn't matter! Dimensional integration is no longer a dream, it's about to become reality and I shall be beyond the reach of your venomous tendrils. I have the equipment to unite the worlds, I have the rock... I have your daughter. I'd say see you later, but I'm off to the bigger world and you're stuck here, trying to pull yourself back together. Slime bucket!"

The fungus writhed intensely and made a mad groaning gurgling sound.

 **SMB**

Daisy sat alone in Koopa's suite, except for Yoshi who sat next to her, making soft sounds as he bit and tugged at his chain.

"Don't do that," said Daisy as she petted him. "You'll only hurt yourself."

She sighed as she got back to her feet and absently ran her finger down the inlay of a decorative metal egg. Behind her Koopa quietly materialized from the shadows and watched her. Yoshi bit some more at his chain until he sensed Koopa's presence and ran back into the shadows, making Daisy turn around.

"For sixty-five million years we've been exiled," Koopa spoke. "But now it's time to claim our rightful place in the other dimension. Reptiles were the most successful species the world had seen when mammals were tiny shrews scuttling in the undergrowth."

Koopa held up his hand, the rock dangling from his cord. Daisy gasped, recognizing it.

"This is the key. With it I have the power to bring together the two dimensions and save this world. You've seen it out there. This place is dying, our resources consumed. But there's a gateway to another world, the world where you grew up."

"That's my world, the one where I belong. I don't belong here," Daisy insisted.

"But you know that's not true. You always knew deep down that you never belonged, that you were different, a stranger."

Irrevocably, Daisy was drawn closer to Koopa as though hypnotized. She was drawn in by the sensuous voice and the reptilian eyes. They were inches apart when the spell was again broken by Lena walking in on the two. Angered, Koopa's face regressed again as he turned to address Lena.

"What is it?"

"Security wants to call in plumbers and electricians to fix the faults in the Tower to speed up the search for the intruders but their break-in has put the building in lockdown. All external communications are jammed without your express override."

"They'll have it. Now leave," Koopa demanded.

Lena's nostrils flared before the jealousy inside her burst out. "Why do you even want with her? You have the crystal! And you have _me_!"

"She's of royal blood, my dear. You are not!" he bit out.

"You care about her more than you care about me!" she accused.

"What I care about is the survival of our species!"

 **SMB**

Mario and Luigi had climbed up eighty stories in the shaft. The drop below them seems to stretch on for infinity. Mario paused in his climb to wipe of the sweat of the exertion off his brow and to catch his breath.

"What?" asked Luigi from beneath him.

"This stuff is getting thicker," the elder brother answered.

It was true. The ladder above them was tangled in coils of the stuff and beyond that there was a dark mass of it.

"It's only fungus," Luigi reminded. "It's not going to hurt you."

"Well you're not the one getting it all in his face."

Mario resumed his climb, repulsed as the tendrils brushed past his face. He had only progressed a little further before the rung he grabbed snapped off in his hand, causing him to yell as he caught himself. "The fungus has eaten through it!"

"Mario, look!" Luigi pointed to a horizontal ventilation duct opposite them.

"Great. Got a quarter?"

"How's that going to help?"

"I'll flip you for who jumps first."

 **SMB**

In the tower, Goombas forced open elevator doors to release their trapped colleagues, supervised by the security chief who snapped to attention when he saw Koopa approaching.

"Sir!" he saluted.

"What's the situation?" asked Koopa.

"The building is still immobilized, sir. None of the elevators are working now, the people downstairs are boiling and the ones upstairs are freezing."

"Have you gotten anyone to fix it? I gave my authorization for external communication!"

"We're trying sir, but where are we gonna find a plumber at this time of night?"

 **SMB**

In the shaft Luigi had backed down the ladder about fifteen feet. Above him Mario was using the fact that the fungus had weakened the integrity of the ladder to their advantage to reach the vent on the opposite wall. He was slowly loosening a section of the ladder from the shaft.

"Are you sure that's long enough to reach across?" questioned Luigi.

"We'll know soon enough, won't we?" Mario answered.

As it turned out, soon was sooner than Mario expected as the section of the ladder detached from the shaft with a sudden cracking noise, his weight propelling it into space across the terrifying void. Then end settled with inches to spare on the lip of the vent tunnel. Mario was hanging beneath it, dangling into space.

"Mario!" Luigi called out.

"Get yourself across fast! I dunno how long it'll hold!" barked Mario.

Luigi scrambled up the ladder inched onto the precarious bridge cautiously. He started edging forward slowly on his hands and knees, his weight causing it to buckle. The far end of the ladder came perilously close to the edge of the vent. Luigi proceeded agonizingly slow until he was over Mario whose knuckles had become white and hesitated.

"What are you waiting for? One of us has to get across!"

With a shaky breath, Luigi carried on and finally reached the relative safety of the vent. Mario started inching towards the duct, hand over hand until he reached the lip. The ladder, however, prevented him from swinging up.

"Luigi, grab my wrist and when I give the word, kick the ladder away."

"I don't if I can brace myself."

"Just do it! My arms are tearing themselves out of their sockets!"

Mario released one hand and Luigi grabbed it, his feet pushing against the side of the vent duct for purchase.

"Kick the ladder NOW!"

Mario let go of the ladder with his other hand and Luigi kicked it away. Now the only thing keeping Mario from a long fall was his and Luigi's grip which was slipping because of their sweaty palms.

"Mario, hurry up! I don't think I can hold you for long!"

"Start pulling, Luigi! I'm slipping!"

"Just a little more, hold on!"

"Luigi, hurry! I can't hold on for..."

In that second Mario and Luigi's grips slipped and Mario fell down the long shaft.

"MARIO!"

"LUIGI!"

Their voices echoed up and down until the fungus below Mario suddenly ballooned outward, creating a surface for him to land on and launch him back up.

"Luigi, help!"

Luigi made a mad grab for his brother but missed. Mario fell again, hitting the fungus trampoline and bouncing up again to Luigi's level who this time caught him successfully.

"Oh, I hate heights," Mario muttered.

"Some catch, huh Mario? Maybe I should try out for the Yankees!" grinned Luigi.

"Yeah, I'd shake your hand but then you'd be an only child. Now help pull me up!"

"Sure," grunted Luigi, "but when we get back to our dimension, I'm taking you to the gym. You could stand to lose a few pounds!"

With a few more grunts and groans, Mario was safely in the ventilation duct and the brothers took a minute to catch their breath before continuing. As they crawled further in, Mario noticed ice starting to form.

"Look, it's icing up. We sure did a number on their heating system."

Behind Mario, Luigi was looking through an inspection plate in the bottom of the duct. From his vantage point he could just make out a bed to the side with the outline of someone in it with a head of hair that looked like Daisy's.

"Mario," he called. "I think we found her!"

Mario came over to look and slapped his hand over his mouth because he could make out a Goomba from his position which he pointed out to Luigi quietly. The younger brother just smiled.

"Hey Mario, I got an idea..."

The Goomba on duty in the barracks turned his head when he heard something metallic hit the floor. He walked over and picked it up. It was a screw. He swiveled his weapon upwards towards the inspection plate when it fell in with a loud clang, knocking it out spread eagle on the floor. Mario and Luigi dropped down a second later.

"Mario?" asked Pauline when she saw the brothers.

"Pauline?" Mario asked, only just recognizing the woman as Luca Santini's sister from when they were all kids growing up on the same street.

"You know this guy, Pauline?" asked one of the girls.

"This is Marion and his brother, Luigi. They've come to rescue us, right guys?"

The other women in the room cheered. They were all the same age and fully dressed with blankets wrapped tightly around them.

"You must be the missing Brooklyn girls," said Luigi.

"Angelica here's actually from Manhattan, but she's all right," one of the women smiled and pointed to a girl with brunette hair.

"I was all right until someone turned off the heat. Now I'm freezing my ass off!"

Mario and Luigi exchanged glances with each other. This was more than they had bargained for.

 **SMB**

In Koopa's suite the temperature was also dropping. Daisy shivered as she hugged herself and moved around, trying futilely to stay warm. Her attention was drawn to the door when it opened and Lena stepped in. Daisy recoiled as the other woman approached her, her face unreadable.

"Don't be afraid," she said as she walked closer. "No one's going to hurt you."

She circled Daisy slowly, taking the time to examine her closely. She gently touched a strand of Daisy's hair and trailed her hand down until it rested on her shoulder where it caressed her skin.

"You're beautiful. You have soft smooth skin... it's no wonder Koopa want you for his queen."

"I'd rather die," Daisy stated.

"Well if that's what you want..." said Lena as she drew a small dagger and prepared to plunge it into the soft vulnerable flesh. "It can be easily arranged."

Lena's hand began the downwards arc but was stopped suddenly by something slimy wrapping around her wrist. With all her attention on Daisy, Lena had failed to notice Yoshi come up behind her. The little dinosaur had shot his tongue out like a frog and caught her wrist. Lena's arm was now being dragged into a gaping mouth filled with sharp pointed lethal teeth. She yanked back, trying to free her hand.

"Get it off me!" she demanded.

But Daisy saw her opportunity to escape and ran to the door, leaving Lena to her fate. Lena snarled, angry at Yoshi for preventing her from taking out the princess and darted her hand forward, plunging the knife into the side of the unfortunate dinosaur who yelped and released his hold on the woman. Lena got to feet and quickly got out of the room. A chill ran down her spine as she realized that if Koopa found out that Daisy had escaped, he would be very displeased.

 **SMB**

"So, Mario, what's your plan for bustin' us out of here?" asked Pauline back in the Goomba barracks.

Not having a clue how to accomplish such a feat, Mario and Luigi look at one another.

"Actually, before we break anyone out of anywhere, we gotta find Daisy," said Luigi.

"Well she doesn't room with us," said another of the girls.

"Yeah, the little princess is up in the penthouse," informed Pauline.

From the look on his faice, it's obvious that Luigi isn't about to stop. Mario sees this and scoops up the fallen Goomba's weapon.

"You girls just hang tight, we'll be back for you. We promise. Let's go, Luigi."

"Mario Brothers to the rescue..."

* * *

A/N: I did not expect to have another update for this fic so soon. Guess my muse has returned for this fanfic at least. The end of this story is in sight and I estimate one, maybe two more chapters plus an epilogue to go. As always, I hope you all have like this chapter and please leave a review. I really do welcome the criticism as long as it's constructive. Until next time, keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


	10. The Merge Begins

Ch. 9: The Merge Begins...

Mario and Luigi ran through the corridors of Koopa Tower, looking for daisy or something that could help them find her. They rounded a corner and skidded to a sudden halt. Goombas were in front of them, restraining Larry and Roy.

"Plumbers!" yelled Larry.

"We are in need of some assistance!" asked Roy.

"Help us out of this and we'll help you find Daisy, eh? A bit of quid pro quo?"

The brothers had not time to answer the plea for help as the Goombas raised their weapons and fired two balls of flame at them. They dodged to safety back around the corner only just in time.

"How do we help those two clowns?" Mario asked as another fireball flew past them.

"Hey, Mario, trust me..." said Luigi as he reached above them for a fire extinguisher mounted on the wall.

"Luigi, what are you doing?" hissed Mario as his brother darted back into the corridor and into the path of the fireballs.

The younger sibling raised the hose of the fire extinguisher and released its contents into the faces of the two Goombas, blinding them until he got close enough to knock each of them out with a solid whack to the head with the extinguisher.

"We are indebted to you for assisting us out of that undesirable predicament," thanked Roy.

"Indeed. Now, how can we repay said debt?" asked Larry.

"We're looking for Daisy. Do either of you have any idea where Koopa might be holding her?" Luigi questioned.

"If she is not in the Goomba barracks with the other girls we took from your dimension then Koopa must be holding her in his suite on this floor," Larry answered.

"That seems a likely assumption," agreed Roy.

"Well we already found the missing Brooklyn girls so she must in Koopa's digs," said Mario.

"We know the way to Koopa's suite, follow us and you'll be on your way home quicker than you can swallow a fried tweeter."

Luigi smiled at the prospect of rescuing Daisy but his thoughts were thrown off track when they heard a panicked scream come from somewhere down the hallway.

"That's Daisy!" Luigi exclaimed. "She's in trouble, we gotta help her!"

Mario looked at the still unconscious Goombas and quickly snatched one of their weapons. "This way!" he said and took the lead.

 **SMB**

Daisy sneaked through the corridor as quickly as she could, looking all around for a way to get out of the tower. Every few feet she would stop momentarily and strain her ears, listening for guards or Goombas around the corner. After a few tense minutes of searching, Daisy found a stairwell but it was infested with the fungus. She was visibly repulsed by it but took a breath and went in any way. Her face twisted in displeasure as the tendrils brushed past her hair and face. As she continued downwards, the ground beneath her started to become soft and spongy. Daisy slowed down, taking time to test the next step which seemed solid enough. But as soon as she put her full weight on it, it buckled partway, throwing her off balance and into the wall which caved inwards, having been eaten through by the fungus.

Daisy was plunged into another room and fell downwards until a mess of the fungus caught her and started writhing around her. She screamed in panic and started to struggle against the fungus as the tendrils coiled around her and started tightening. Someone outside the room started pounding on the door, trying to force it open without success. The pushing stopped momentarily and then the door was pushed inward violently, revealing Luigi, Mario, holding a pry bar, and Larry and Roy.

"Luigi! Help me!" called Daisy.

Mario struggled with the Goomba weapon, trying to figure out how it worked. Suddenly a jet of flame shot out from the barrel and Mario grinned.

"Perfect, I'll barbeque the sucker!"

"Wait! Don't do that!" exclaimed Roy as he grabbed the barrel of the weapon and forced it down.

"What? Why not? That fungus is killing Daisy!"

"That fungus is her father!" Larry informed. "Your highness, stop! That's your daughter!"

No sooner had the words left Larry's mouth than the fungus calmed down and released Daisy who slid easily to the floor where she was immediately embraced by Luigi.

"Are you all right?" he whispered.

"I'm fine, thank you. But what are they doing here?" she asked, pulling back from Luigi to look at Larry and Roy.

"Your highness, allow us to explain," Roy explained. "You see, we have always been your loyalist supporters. We've been with your father here since he became Koopa's first victim of de-evolution."

"Granted, we weren't always the best help. We weren't the sharpest of fangs and Koopa was stronger than both of us but we tried to help your father as much as we could. When Koopa sent us though the portal to collect you, we brought back different women as a delaying tactic until we had a plan to make sure you'd remain safe and Koopa wouldn't unite the worlds," continued Larry.

"Things didn't go according to plan, obviously, but without you Koopa's plan won't work."

"Why does he even need me? What make me so special?"

"Your mother was a Portal Keeper, you have their DNA and Koopa needs a Portal Keeper to merge the dimensions as you're the only one who can withstand the powers that are released when the rock is put into the machine."

Daisy took a deep breath as she absorbed the information she had just learned. She looked back at the mass of fungus and asked another question.

"The fungus is my father? Koopa de-evolved him?"

"That is correct, he was the first to be removed in Koopa's coup."

"That explains why the fungus has been helping us, giving us the little things, saving your life in the shaft, Mario. It hates Koopa and wants to clobber him as much as we do!" Luigi smiled.

"Well then, it appears I owe you a thank you for the assistance you've been giving us. Your majesty," Mario said.

"OK, now we've found the other Brooklyn girls, we've got Daisy, we can go home now!"

"No, we can't!" Daisy said. "Koopa has my crystal! If we don't do something about it he's gonna invade New York! Millions of lives will be lost!"

Mario and Luigi look at each other again. They had no choice in the matter.

"We gotta stop him," said Mario simply.

"No argument," agreed Luigi.

"We can't go out the way we came in," explained Larry as he and Roy shuffled back to the group from the door. "The hallway outside is teeming with Goombas! It's only a matter of time until they check this room as well!"

"Then that means we're trapped in here," Daisy realized. "There's not another way out."

Things indeed look grim for them and just as Mario was thinking that they'd had it, the fungus started writhing and straining at an area where it was embedded in the wall. The plaster cracked and chipped and fell to the floor. The cracks widened until with a final heave, a section of the wall fell away, providing another way of escape.

Relieved, everyone started scrambling though, Mario going last and grabbed an offshoot of the fungus, giving it a handshake. "Thanks, and don't worry. We'll take care of Koopa."

 **SMB**

"Sir, all the main systems have failed. We're running on auxiliaries now and we don't know how long those will last."

The security chief was in Koopa's office, filling him in in person, despite the fear that Koopa might tear him to pieces.

"What about the girl? Where is she?"

The security chief visibly shrank and opened and closed his mouth several times, trying to gather up the courage to answer. He was saved from having to, though, when Koopa held up his hand to silence him, his eyes on the closer circuit TV monitor on his desk, not believing what he was seeing. On the monitor, Mario, Luigi, Daisy, Larry, and Roy were running down a corridor. The security chief shrank back even more when he saw Koopa's features begin to regress again.

"Plumbers..."

 **SMB**

In the corridors, the group hit a fork. Mario and Luigi had gotten all turned around and no idea which way to go to get back to the barracks where the Brooklyn girls were waiting for them.

"All right, which way do we go?" Mario asked Larry and Roy.

"We don't know," replied Roy.

"You don't know? How can you not know?"

"We were never told where the girls were kept," defended Larry.

"Aw, great! What else could go wrong? Guess we'll have to choose at random. Let's go... left."

"No, let's go right," Luigi countered.

"What makes you so sure?"

"I just am. I got a feeling."

"Yeah, you also had a feeling about the Mets winning the pennant."

"Mario – just this once – could you please trust me?"

Mario was prepared to overrule Luigi when he realized that his brother was asserting himself in front of Daisy. He drew in a long breath and let it out through his nose.

"All right, lead on. I'm right behind you."

Luigi grinned, enjoying the moment. He took Daisy's hand and led her forward until, with all the speed of a guillotine, a barred gate descended from the ceiling, missing Mario by inches and cutting them off. Luigi's side of the hallway was flooded with light and security guards and Goombas approached.

"Mario, get out of here!" said Luigi.

The elder brother hesitated, but then he saw the firepower on the other side of the gate and reluctantly high tailed it out of there, Larry and Roy following close behind.

 **SMB**

Daisy and Luigi were dragged into Koopa's office where the pale faced dictator was waiting for them.

"Restrain her and take her to the impact site. Kill him," ordered Koopa.

"No, please don't hurt him!" Daisy pleaded. "Spare his life and I'll be your queen!"

Koopa looked at Daisy for a long second before smiling wickedly. "I have a better idea. I'll kill him and you'll still be my queen."

Desperate, Daisy flung herself at the smug tyrant and clawed at his face. Held in the iron grip of a Goomba, Luigi was powerless to help and could only struggle futilely and watch. Koopa grabbed Daisy by her hair and yanked her off him, eliciting a pained gasp in the process. In his anger his face once more started regressing. He threw Daisy harshly against the wall and snarled.

"How dare you!" He raised his hand, prepared to swipe at Daisy but calmed himself before he could do anything if only just. "Keep them alive just long enough to witness the invasion of their world."

 **SMB**

Mario, Larry, and Roy found the Goomba barracks they were looking for at last. Mario pushed open the door and was immediately bombarded with questions from the girls but were quieted when they saw who Mario had with him.

"Hey, I recognize those two creeps," Pauline raised an accusing finger. "They're the ones who kidnapped me and brought me here!"

"Yeah, they kidnapped me as well. My date had dropped me off at my apartment building and they grabbed me before I unlocked the front gate," added Angelica.

The rest of the girls quickly followed suit, looking like they were ready to tear the hapless duo in front of them in half.

"Girls!" Mario yelled. "First of all, Larry and Roy are all right. They didn't want to take any of you but didn't exactly have a choice. Second, Koopa has my brother and Daisy and I have to figure out how to get them back."

"Well we also gotta get out of here," Pauline pointed out.

"OK, but the power in the building is shot. We're gonna have to take the stairs."

"In these heels?" Pauline asked incredulously.

"Let's just hurry up and do something before the frost attacks my extremities," pleaded Angelica.

"It's got plenty to work with," sneered Pauline.

Angelica's use of the word, 'frost' triggered something in Mario's memory and he looked up at the open ventilation shaft he and Luigi had come in through. He had an idea.

 **SMB**

The door to the barrack flew in off its hinges and collided heavily with the wall opposite it. Goombas quickly stormed into the room, weapons raised in a ready position but there was no one in the room save another unconscious Goomba. A sound coming from the open vent shaft drew their attention to it.

In the shaft Mario, Larry, Roy, and the girls are holding onto a mattress for dear life as they slid down the iced over shaft at a quickening pace. They whizzed around a hair pin turn, looking like an overloaded bobsled team when a fireball exploded just inches behind them. Mario craned his neck to look behind them and saw a trio of Goombas chasing after them using the door they had blasted off its hinges. The even worse part was that the door was faster on the ice than the mattress was.

Ahead of them was a curtain of sharp stalactites that promised injury at the very least if not avoided.

"Duck... NOW!" exclaimed Mario and leaned everyone back on the mattress. The ice stalactites passed within inches of their faces. Behind them the pursuing Goombas were not as lucky as one of them wasn't fast enough to dodge and was knocked off the back of the door.

"That's one down, two to go!" Mario laughed and looked ahead to see the next obstacle. This time there was a sheer drop ahead of them in the shaft. If his somewhat dangerous and hastily conceived plan worked, then they would be able to get away and lose the Goombas. Of course, they'd have to survive as well.

"Everybody lean left... NOW!" he yelled. Everyone leaned and the mattress executed a hair-raising maneuver, a harrowing 360-degree corkscrew turn. The girls all screamed as if they were riding a roller coaster.

Behind them the Goombas also saw the hole in front of them but were too uncoordinated to avoid it. The weight of the door hit the lip of the hole and turned over, tipping the Goombas in. Mario and the girls laughed at losing the Goombas and looked ahead. They were on the final stretch and an outlet with a mesh cover was coming up fast.

"Hold tight," Mario advised as he leaned back and held up his feet, still stuffed into the Thwomp Stompers, to take the impact.

The mesh grid was ripped away on impact and in an instant, everyone on the mattress found themselves suspended in the air, surrounded by neon and noise. They started to fall through the air quickly, a descent suddenly jerked to a stop by a section of the grid that hung around the city powering the cars. They had missed a space in the grid by inches.

"Is everyone alive?"

"I think I broke a nail..." said Angelica.

"Medic!" said Pauline.

"How are we getting down from here?" asked another of the girls.

"Well there's a gap right in front of us but the traffic here is crazier than Manhattan at Christmas time. I don't think it would be safe."

Mario looked around for another way down but came up empty. He was reconsidering braving the haphazard traffic below when his train of thought was interrupted.

"Mario!" he heard.

He looked around wildly until he found who had called his name. It was Toad, in a stolen Sludge-Gulper and lumbering in their direction.

"Toad!" Mario yelled gratefully. "Bring it under us! We'll jump on board!"

Toad maneuvered the Sludge-Gulper to where Mario had indicated and stopped, causing a multi-car pileup behind him as everyone on the mattress hopped down onto the roof of the garbage vehicle.

"It's great to see you, Toad," grinned Mario. "Koopa has my brother, Daisy, and the rock he needs to merge our dimensions. If we don't do something people in Brooklyn and the world are gonna die."

"He is right!" proclaimed Roy. "If we're to have a hope of stopping Koopa then we must make it to the meteor chamber!"

"Correct!" Larry confirmed. "Koopa altered Portal Keeper technology to merge the worlds but it needs a direct connection to the power of the meteor to work. If we can stop Koopa there, get you back to your world with the rock and seal the gateway, he's finished!"

Without warning of any sort, New York suddenly started superimposing itself over the buildings in Dinohattan. Yellow cabs, a hot dog vendor, and neon signs for Broadway plays swam into focus. A New York cop suddenly found himself in the middle of a Dinohattan traffic pileup. Everything remained frozen as it was for a few seconds before dissolving away again.

"What was that?" asked Pauline, still wide-eyed and needing confirmation that what she just saw wasn't her imagination.

"It's starting," Larry and Roy said simultaneously.

* * *

A/N: Season's greetings to all! Here's an early gift for you all. I very much expect that there will be one more chapter in this re-write before it's done. Thanks so much for sticking with it and reviewing. In fact, hit that review button right now. Reviews are some of the best gifts I could receive this year. Next up, the showdown between the Mario's and Koopa in Brooklyn. Stay tuned to find out what happens. Keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


	11. The Super Mario Bros

Chapter 10

Energy crackled and sparked across every metal surface in the room as Koopa attempted to force the crystal into its slot in the Portal Keeper machinery. Every attempt he made was met with maddening resistance as the energy built up and denied him victory. Koopa's muscles bulged, his face was a mask of anger and his latest effort to start the merging resulted in the energy blasting him across the room.

"WHAT IS HAPPENING?" he roared as his face once again regressed, this time devolving further than it ever had before.

"Only a Portal Keeper can use any of this equipment!" Daisy explained as she struggled against the Goomba restraining her. "We're the only ones who can withstand the forces! Give it to me!"

"You'd help that guy?" Luigi exclaimed, looking gutted at the betrayal.

"I'm sorry, Luigi, but I don't belong in your world. I've learned that here."

A malevolent smile of victory appeared on Koopa's face as he handed the crystal to Daisy. She took it and subtly twisted it so that the shard would go in upside down. She approached the receptacle and inserted the rock. As soon as she did, she was bathed in a ghostly white light and everything went haywire.

 **SMB**

In Brooklyn, people were holding a candlelight vigil for the missing girls at the site of the latest abduction, the university dinosaur excavation at the Brooklyn Bridge. About a hundred people were present, all of them holding lit candles. Reporters and journalists were on scene, the TV news reporters broadcasting live when Luca Santini showed up. He pushed his way through the crowd as the reporters shoved cameras and mics in his face and journalists threw questions at him.

"Don't you have any respect!" he yelled at the crowd. "My sister is missing too! Lighting candles isn't gonna bring anyone back!"

Two things happened at once as soon as the words left Santini's lips. First, the whole of New York felt a tremor run through it and second, the water of the East River right by the Brooklyn Bridge started churning and boiling violently, a light becoming visible in its depths.

The merging of the two worlds had begun for real.

 **SMB**

Koopa Tower was experiencing a quake. The whole building was vibrating, scaring Lena who was making her way through a corridor, looking for a safe way out. The power in the building had failed completely, but ahead of her there was a light and she could hear music. She stumbled through and emerged on a Broadway stage, bewildered and disoriented.

Audience and actors alike looked in equal confusion at her until the theater began to shake, causing a panic. The actors fled the stage and the audience got up from their seats and hurried to the exits, pushing and shoving with a ferocity that easily matched the shoving of the crowds in Dinohattan. Lena made to follow them but stumbled and fell under a large chandelier. Lena heard something break and looked up, having just enough time to see the chandelier falling towards her before it impaled her.

 **SMB**

The Meteorite Chamber was vibrating dangerously. Cracks were spreading across the walls and rocks were falling from the ceilings. Koopa threw himself at Daisy, throwing her away from the machine and tried to undo what she had done. Daisy stumbled around, coughing through the choking dust when Luigi pulled her out of the way of a falling rock that would have killed her.

At the other end of the chamber, Mario entered followed by Larry, Roy, Toad, and the Brooklyn Girls. He saw Luigi and Daisy on the opposite end and Koop, looking murderously at them. "Hey! Turtle breath!"

Koopa's head swiveled to look and got a glance of Mario before the plumber hit him in the shoulder and side of his face with the flame launcher. He screamed as he was thrown back into the Portal Keeper equipment which exploded on impact. The power of the meteorite was now running wild.

"C'mon, this way! Last portal to Brooklyn!" called Larry as he, Roy, and Toad ushered the girls through the fluctuating portal.

"Your Highness, it's time to go!" said Roy as the last girl went through.

"Let's get out of here!" Luigi agreed as he took hold of Daisy's hand. "C'mon, Mario! It's time to get the hell out of Dodge!"

Daisy and Luigi made it through, followed by their friends and lastly, Mario. Just as he was almost all the way through the portal, something grabbed hold of his foot, stopping him.

"You will not escape, plumber!" Koopa hissed, his burned face regressing rapidly.

A final explosion behind him through Koopa off balance and pushed him and Mario into the portal.

 **SMB**

On the other side of the portal, everyone was in rapidly rising water as Luigi pounded on the solid rock face where the exit had been.

"C'mon! He's gotta still be in there, he's gotta!" Luigi said, beside himself with worry.

"Luigi, we have to go, or we'll drown!" pleaded Daisy.

"Yeah, what happened anyway?" asked Pauline.

"Your brother must have hired someone to blow up the dig and now we're going to die," Daisy answered.

Something hit her in the leg and when she looked down, she laughed.

"What is it?" Luigi asked.

"Look," she smiled.

Dinosaur bones swirled through the torrent of water around them, freed by the blast.

"Santini thought he could force us out by flooding the site. He just made our job easier!"

With one last look at the rockface, Luigi made up his mind. "All right girls, let's get out of here. Swim for it."

 **SMB**

Outside the dig, the protestors had gotten back to their feet after the tremor that ran through the city. One of the protestors looked at the entrance to the cavern where the excavation was being held, blinked, rubbed her eyes, looked again, and shouted.

"Look!"

Everyone looked as the missing Brooklyn girls all climbed out of the site, followed by Larry, Roy, Toad, and finally Luigi and Daisy. The crowd surged forward as the missing girls were reunited with family and reporters and newscaster jockeyed to ask questions and get the best scoop. Luca Santini approached his sister and grabbed in a big bear hug.

"We thought you were dead," he said.

Pauline pushed him away from her, glaring at him. "We'd have been fine if you hadn't blown up the tunnel! You almost got us drowned!"

"But... how the hell did you get down there?"

"It's a long story, but we're all safe thanks to the Mario brothers."

"The Mario brothers?"

"Hey, are you one of the Mario brothers?" asked a newscaster as camera were shoved in Luigi's face.

"All these girls are saying that you're the ones who saved them and a sub-dimension from this Koopa!"

"A pair of plumbers?"

"Sure, they did," answered Daisy.

"If anyone's a hero, it's my brother, Mario. And he's still down there!" Luigi answered as he looked back at the tunnel entrance.

"The plumbers who saved the world, uh huh," said the newscaster as he turned back to the camera. "I think the police are going to want to talk to them later, but undeniably the missing Brooklyn girls have been returned. And just who is responsible has yet to be determined by the courts..."

The newscaster was interrupted as a rumble in the direction of the East River grabbed everyone's attention. Screams of panic rose from the people on the bridge as the churning water exploded upward in a spout.

"That's gotta be Mario..." Luigi muttered, and took off running towards the bridge.

 **SMB**

Mario felt dizzy as he slowly and unsteadily got back to his feet. He stumbled twice before he got his bearings back and took several rapid steps back. He was atop one of the bridge towers and below him, the water of the river had turned into whirlpool, alight with the energy of the meteorite. What got Mario's full attention, however, was Koopa, now a full reptilian beast, on the side of the tower and climbing up. Mario's mind worked frantically to figure out how to get down when he remembered he was still wearing the Thwomp Stompers. He clicked his heels but instead of the high-pitched beeps, he heard an error tone. The Bullet Bill cartridges were empty. He hadn't reloaded them! Mario fumbled with the cartridge belt and removed two Bullet Bill's, slamming them into the ports as quick as he could. Koopa crested the edge of the tower and roared, startling his foe.

"Whoa!" Mario jumped back, just avoiding getting hit with the acid Koopa had spat at him. "You're in New York now, my Brooklyn! You'll never fit in unless you learn to ace like a human being."

Koopa lunged and Mario rolled out of the way only just in time.

 **SMB**

Luigi was running along the bridge towards the tower where Mario was battling Koopa when something else ejected in the water sprout fell in front of him. It was Daisy's crystal. Without thinking he picked it up and continued to run to the tower where Mario was running out of room and slowly being cornered.

"I have to get up there..."

"Luigi! What are you going to do when you get up there?" gasped Daisy as she ran up behind him. "Look at that! Koopa's devolved into something else entirely!"

"I don't know what I'm going to do, but I've got to do something!"

Luigi reached into his tool belt, intending to grab a pipe wrench but his fingers found something else. It was that funny little bomb the fungus had given him back in the other dimension.

"Bob-omb!" exclaimed Roy who had just arrived and saw the device.

"You know what this is?" asked Luigi.

"Please be careful with that, it's far more powerful than you think!" pleaded Larry as the two took several steps back.

"I think I know what I'm gonna do now," Luigi smiled at Daisy and clicked his heels together. The stompers launched him skyward to help his brother and face Koopa.

 **SMB**

On top of the bridge Mario stumbled, falling on his back and Koopa lunged. Mario did the only thing he could think of and raised his feet which impacted with Koopa's chest. The devolved dictator snapped at his nemesis, extending his neck as far as it would go.

"I am the lizard king!" he roared. "I need nothing from you! You're nothing but a plumber! A plumber!"

"You got that right," said Luigi as he landed on top of the tower.

Koop turned his head to face Luigi and let out another dreadful roar, opening his maw to its widest. A smile ghosted across Luigi's face as he turned the key on the side of the Bob-omb and threw it into Koopa's mouth. The dictator choked and gagged, turning his head up, trying to cough back up the offending device.

"You're right about one thing, Koopa," said Mario. "We're just plumbers... and you're a piece of shit!"

Mario clicked his heels together and with a beep and a hiss of air, Koopa was launched backwards off the tower and into the dimensional whirlpool below. Koopa disappeared amongst the energy until an explosion shook the vortex. It stuttered, flashed, rippled, and finally collapsed in on itself and winked out of existence with a bright flash of light.

The assembled crowd of people being held back by police on the bridge cheered. Mario and Luigi smiled and each put another set of cartridges into their Stompers. When they landed Luigi was immediately embraced by Daisy and Mario by Pauline.

"Hey, Daisy, I have something for you," Luigi grinned as he took the crystal out of his pocket.

"The rock!" Daisy gasped and gave Luigi a big hug. "Thank you so much..."

Reporters again swarmed them but were held back if only just by police as paramedics arrived and escorted the brothers to an ambulance. Inside and on the way to the hospital Luigi started rambling.

"Hey, Mario..."

"Yeah, Luigi?"

"You know, Pop's advice and what he taught us actually came in handy in the sub-dimension."

"Yeah... it did."

"Do you think he knew we would get sucked into a sub-dimension where dinosaurs still exist?"

"I don't think so..."

"He always said we'd thank him eventually, didn't he?"

"Yeah... Can't you give him something to make him go to sleep?" Mario asked the paramedic.

"I already have."

"Thanks Pop..." Luigi slurred. "Now you say it."

"Gimme a break."

"C'mon, say it. Say it, say it, say it."

"Oh, be quiet..."

"C'mon, say it," the paramedic said. "It won't kill you."

Mario was silent for a second before sighing and quickly muttering out, "Thankspop."

 **SMB**

Mario and Luigi had to spend the night in the hospital but were released the next day. Mario was grumbling about how high the bill would likely be and wondering how they were going to afford it when they ran into Daisy, Pauline, Larry, Roy, and Toad waiting for them in the lobby. Pauline told them that Luca would cover the hospital bill for them in thanks for returning her safely. The shoe dropped, though, when Daisy informed Luigi of her decision to return to the sub-dimension.

"It's solid, your highness," said Roy as he and Larry inspected the rockface where the portal had been.

They were all in the cavern which was now clear of the dinosaur fossils and Daisy's face looked downturned. Luigi put a comforting hand on her shoulder when the crystal which was back around Daisy's neck began to glow. Daisy took it in her hand and when she did, a beam of light shot out from the pointed end and hit the wall, creating ripples and distortions. The portal was open again.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Luigi inquired, hoping she would decide last minute to stay.

"I'm sorry, Luigi," answered Daisy. "But I have to go back. I'm a princess! I have a duty to help rebuild that world. My world. And besides, my father is there. Larry and Roy say they can evolve him again and I'd like to meet him when he's not a bunch of fungus infesting the city."

"I-I guess I understand..." Luigi admitted sadly.

"Hey, this isn't good-bye. The portal's still here and I'll come back for visits," she promised.

Daisy smiled sadly at Luigi before standing up on her toes and giving him a quick kiss on the lips.

"I'll be back. I promise."

"Hey," said Toad as he approached the brothers. "It's been real here. But the princess is right. Now that Koopa's gone, our world needs to rebuild. Maybe then we can finally join our two dimensions in peace."

"Correct," agreed Larry and Roy. "If at all possible, our two worlds meeting should be done in an atmosphere that is devoid of malice or malicious intent."

The party of four departed through the portal, one after the other with Daisy going last. After she went through the ripples in the rock ceased and became solid again. Luigi stared longingly at where the portal had been for a minute before Mario took a hold of his arm and started leading him back to the surface.

"C'mon, Luigi," he said quietly. "She's gone. No reason for us to stick around. But she'll be back, kid. You can count on it."

"Yeah, count on it..."

 **SMB**

THREE WEEKS LATER...

"That's a lovely dress, Pauline. Is it new?"

"Thanks for noticing, and yes, it is," Pauline smiled.

Mario and Pauline were in the kitchen of the Mario brother's apartment making lunch while Luigi sat disconsolately in the living room, watching the latest episode of _Miraculous World_.

"Luigi, are you gonna mope around or come and eat?" asked Mario as carried a bowl of pasta to the table.

"Yeah, I'll be there in a minute..."

Mario sighed but nodded his head and continued to set up the table with Pauline's help. He was startled out of his thoughts by Luigi calling him.

"Hey, Mario! Come quick! We're on _Miraculous World_!"

 _"... And now we have the story of the Mario brothers, plumbers who found themselves in a sub-dimension and rescued it from a ruthless dictator. Along the way they saved our world from an invasion and returned the girls that had been missing from Brooklyn. I'd call them the Super Mario Brothers..."_

There was a knock on the apartment door and Mario said absently, "It's open..."

"Luigi! Mario! I need your help!" exclaimed Daisy as she threw open the door to the brothers' apartment. She looked like she had just escaped a war zone, dressed in torn black coveralls, combat boots, and a bandolier. She had dirt smudged on her face and was armed with a flame launcher.

"Daisy! What's wrong?" asked Luigi, his stunned face mirroring Mario's.

"We have a leak," she answered.

"Looks like we've got work, Luigi," said Mario as he and his brother moved to pull on their coveralls. "Don't forget your belt, it's got everything a plumber needs."

"Not exactly everything," Daisy amended as she took out some Bullet Bill cartridges. "You'll need the Stompers."

"Must be some job..." said Mario.

Luigi just smiled. "Come on, big brother, nothing the Super Mario Brothers can't fix!"

* * *

A/N: FINALLY FINISHED! If you want to know what happens to Mario and Luigi on their next adventure in Dinohattan, it won't come from me. However, You can check out the sequel to the movie that's being done as a web comic. Just look up SMBthecomicdotcom and you'll find it. Fair warning, though. The comic is incomplete and has not been updated in over two years. So maybe show the comic some love, support it on and maybe we can get it continued.

Keep on writing.

Knight Writer 95


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